Ismail al-Ghoul, an Al Jazeera Arabic correspondent who was held for 12 hours at Gaza’s al-Shifa hospital, says Israeli forces rounded up Palestinian journalists at the facility and made them kneel on the ground for hours, while naked and blindfolded.
“The occupation forces handcuffed and blindfolded us for about 12 hours from the early morning to the afternoon, until the arrival of Israeli military intelligence units,” he said, according to reports by Al Jazeera.
“They interrogated the journalists that work at this location. We were left in the room we were kept in, where we stayed for several hours, in cold conditions, naked and blindfolded.”
Al-Ghoul, who was also reported as having been “severely beaten”, said he had heard that some of his colleagues had been released but he did not have enough information on their whereabouts.
The journalists were seized in a fresh attack on al-Shifa hospital after the medical facility had been previously targeted last November. The hospital has been sheltering thousands of Gazans taking cover from the five-month war.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has condemned the detention of al-Ghoul and his team.
“Journalists play an essential role in a war. They are the eyes and the ears that we need to document what’s happening and with every journalist killed, with every journalist arrested, our ability to understand what’s happening in Gaza diminishes significantly,” said Jodie Ginsberg, chief executive officer of the CPJ.
UN condemnation
UN Secretary-General António Guterres’s spokesperson Farhan Haq also condemned the detention of the journalists.
Replying to questions from Al Jazeera correspondent Biesan Abu Kwaik, Haq said: “We stand against any harassment of journalists anywhere in the world. And certainly we do so in this instance.
“Our sympathies go to your colleague as well as to all the other journalists who suffered from any violence during the course of this incident.”
[embedded content]
The Plight of Palestinian Prisoners –– documentary. Video: Al Jazeera
Another Al Jazeera Arabic journalist, Usaid Siddiqui, said Ismail al-Ghoul was just one of many journalists in Gaza targeted by Israel
“After speaking to him, I can say he is doing fine,” Siddiqui said.
“He had been blindfolded and handcuffed for 12 hours [by Israeli forces] and was taken away for interrogation.
“Journalists are one of the main focuses of the Israeli military campaign in Gaza.
“Ismail has been reporting on Israeli attacks in Gaza since day one of the fighting.
“He has been able to continue reporting despite all the ongoing efforts by the Israeli military to silence the narrative of Palestinians around the world.”
Stormed at dawn
When interviewed by Al Jazeera after his release, al-Ghoul said Israeli forces had stormed al-Shifa Hospital at dawn during intense fighting.
“They started by destroying media equipment and arresting journalists gathered in a room used by media teams,” he said.
“The journalists were stripped of their clothes and were arrested and placed in a room inside the medical compound. They were forced to lie on their stomachs as they were blindfolded and their hands tied.”
Al-Ghoul said Israeli soldiers would open fire to “scare us if there was any movement”.
After about 12 hours, they were taken for interrogation.
Following waiting in line for investigation, an elderly man had been released from inside the hospital and he needed help to leave the compound.
The journalist said he had volunteered to help the man and was able to accompany him until they both got out the compound and he was free.
Al-Ghoul later heard that some of his colleagues had been released but said he did not have enough information about where they were.
ComGen @UNLazzarini: the highest number of people ever recorded as facing human-made famine, along with mass killings, constant harm & creation of conditions that gut life of humanity has a name: Genocide.
Israel wants no witnesses, no truth-tellers.
Respect & solidarity. https://t.co/jeZ7RL24AF
— Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur oPt (@FranceskAlbs) March 18, 2024
Israel wants ‘no truth-tellers’
Meanwhile, the UN Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian Territories said Israeli authorities were preventing entry of a top UN official into the Gaza Strip to “hide their violations of international law”.
“The highest number of people ever recorded as facing human-made famine, along with mass killings, constant harm and creation of conditions that gut life of humanity has a name: Genocide,” Francesca Albanese said in a post on X.
“Israel wants no witnesses, no truth-tellers,” she said, referencing Israel’s blocking of Phillipe Lazzarini, the head of UNRWA, from entering Gaza.
Pacific Media Watch has compiled this media freedom report from Al Jazeera and other news services.
Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz
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Electricity customers in four Australian states can breathe a sigh of relief. After two years in a row of 20% price increases, power prices have finally stabilised. In many places they’re going down.
The good news is contained in two separate draft decisions today by the Australian Energy Regulator and Victoria’s Essential Services Commission, on the maximum price energy retailers can charge electricity consumers under a specific plan that must be offered to all consumers.
The price is officially known as the “default market offer”. It’s the price you’re charged on a “default” plan with an electricity retailer – in other words, the plan customers are on if they haven’t shopped around to find a better deal from competing retailers. The bottom line is, most of these residential electricity customers should receive price reductions of between 0.4% (A$13) and 7.1% ($211) next financial year. In most cases that’s less than the rate of inflation.
The relief is largely the result of a drop in wholesale prices – that’s the price paid to the generators producing electricity. Unfortunately, however, at the same time transmission and distribution prices – or network costs – have gone up. So the savings won’t be as great as they might have been.
This is the sixth year in which regulators have set default market offers for retail electricity customers. They do it where there is competition in the sector: so in southeast Queensland, New South Wales, South Australia and, separately, Victoria.
It does not include Tasmania, the ACT, Western Australia or the Northern Territory, where the relevant regulator sets the prices and there’s no or very little competition.
About 5-10% of consumers across the states involved are on default plans. The rest have a contract arrangement with a retailer. But the draft decision, if enacted, still directly affects hundreds of thousands of people. And as commentators have observed, it sends an important market signal about the general direction of electricity prices.
The Australian Energy Regulator says most residential customers on the default market offer can expect to save on their electricity bills in 2024-25. But the offers vary depending where you live.
Have a look at the table above to see what residential customers without “controlled load” can expect. That covers most households. (Controlled load is when you also have an off-peak tariff for hot water heating.)
Some customers will be paying more for electricity. In Southeast Queensland, residential customers will pay 2.7% more, which is an extra $53 on average.
Using an inflation forecast of 3.3%, the Australian Energy Regulator also calculates what they call the “real” year-to-year variation in prices. So even if there’s a small increase in the price for a particular area, it’s less than the rate of inflation. For that example in southeast Queensland, it equates to a decrease of 0.6% and a saving of $12 in real terms.
Residential customers on the Victorian default market offer can expect to save 6.4%. The retail power prices in Victoria are slightly better than in the other states largely because there are lower wholesale power prices.
All in all it’s a big improvement on the price hikes of last year and the year before that.
The final default market offer prices will be released in May, but we can expect little change.
Read more:
The government will underwrite risky investments in renewables – here’s why that’s a good idea
Regulators set the default market offer by itemising all costs retailers are likely to incur in the course of running their business. From that, they calculate the fair price retailers should offer customers on default plans.
Wholesale electricity costs, incurred when retailers buy electricity from generators on the wholesale market, make up maybe 30–40% of your bill.
The other major cost retailers face is for the electricity transmission and distribution network – that is, the “poles and wires”. These also comprise around 40% of your bill.
The network price is driven by inflation and interest rate rises, and also includes the costs of maintenance, and building new transmission infrastructure to connect renewable energy generators to the grid.
The easing of wholesale prices since their 2022 peak has been offset by increases in these network prices. In fact, network prices have increased by almost as much as wholesale prices have come down.
Read more:
Wholesale power prices are falling fast – but consumers will have to wait for relief. Here’s why
Responding to the draft decision on Tuesday, Federal Energy Minister Chris Bowen said it showed the Albanese government was stabilising energy prices.
But Bowen came to office promising to cut power bills by $275 by 2025. That deadline is not very far away.
Bowen made that commitment in December 2021. Very soon after, electricity prices shot through the roof. It’s becoming very difficult to see how the $275 cost reduction will be achieved by next year.
The bottom line is prices have stabilised after a couple of bad years and hopefully the worst is behind us. But, it would be a brave person who attempts to predict where they go from here. There are too many moving parts. Governments should stay the course on policies, and consumers, worried about electricity prices, should go online, compare offers, and to find the best possible deal.
Tony Wood may have interests in companies impacted by the energy transition through his superannuation fund.
– ref. Finally, good news for power bills: energy regulator promises small savings for most customers on the ‘default market offer’ – https://theconversation.com/finally-good-news-for-power-bills-energy-regulator-promises-small-savings-for-most-customers-on-the-default-market-offer-226020
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The assertion from Queensland’s chief health officer John Gerrard that it’s time to stop using the term “long COVID” has made waves in Australian and international media over recent days.
Gerrard’s comments were related to new research from his team finding long-term symptoms of COVID are similar to the ongoing symptoms following other viral infections.
But there are limitations in this research, and problems with Gerrard’s argument we should drop the term “long COVID”. Here’s why.
The study involved texting a survey to 5,112 Queensland adults who had experienced respiratory symptoms and had sought a PCR test in 2022. Respondents were contacted 12 months after the PCR test. Some had tested positive to COVID, while others had tested positive to influenza or had not tested positive to either disease.
Survey respondents were asked if they had experienced ongoing symptoms or any functional impairment over the previous year.
The study found people with respiratory symptoms can suffer long-term symptoms and impairment, regardless of whether they had COVID, influenza or another respiratory disease. These symptoms are often referred to as “post-viral”, as they linger after a viral infection.
Gerrard’s research will be presented in April at the European Congress of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases. It hasn’t been published in a peer-reviewed journal.
Read more:
I have COVID. How likely am I to get long COVID?
After the research was publicised last Friday, some experts highlighted flaws in the study design. For example, Steven Faux, a long COVID clinician interviewed on ABC’s television news, said the study excluded people who were hospitalised with COVID (therefore leaving out people who had the most severe symptoms). He also noted differing levels of vaccination against COVID and influenza may have influenced the findings.
In addition, Faux pointed out the survey would have excluded many older people who may not use smartphones.
The authors of the research have acknowledged some of these and other limitations in their study.
Based on the research findings, Gerrard said in a press release:
We believe it is time to stop using terms like ‘long COVID’. They wrongly imply there is something unique and exceptional about longer term symptoms associated with this virus. This terminology can cause unnecessary fear, and in some cases, hypervigilance to longer symptoms that can impede recovery.
But Gerrard and his team’s findings cannot substantiate these assertions. Their survey only documented symptoms and impairment after respiratory infections. It didn’t ask people how fearful they were, or whether a term such as long COVID made them especially vigilant, for example.
In discussing Gerrard’s conclusions about the terminology, Faux noted that even if only 3% of people develop long COVID (the survey found 3% of people had functional limitations after a year), this would equate to some 150,000 Queenslanders with the condition. He said:
To suggest that by not calling it long COVID you would be […] somehow helping those people not to focus on their symptoms is a curious conclusion from that study.
Another clinician and researcher, Philip Britton, criticised Gerrard’s conclusion about the language as “overstated and potentially unhelpful”. He noted the term “long COVID” is recognised by the World Health Organization as a valid description of the condition.
An ever-growing body of research continues to show how COVID can cause harm to the body across organ systems and cells.
We know from the experiences shared by people with long COVID that the condition can be highly disabling, preventing them from engaging in study or paid work. It can also harm relationships with their friends, family members, and even their partners.
Despite all this, people with long COVID have often felt gaslit and unheard. When seeking treatment from health-care professionals, many people with long COVID report they have been dismissed or turned away.
Read more:
Social media, activism, trucker caps: the fascinating story behind long COVID
Last Friday – the day Gerrard’s comments were made public – was actually International Long COVID Awareness Day, organised by activists to draw attention to the condition.
The response from people with long COVID was immediate. They shared their anger on social media about Gerrard’s comments, especially their timing, on a day designed to generate greater recognition for their illness.
Since the start of the COVID pandemic, patient communities have fought for recognition of the long-term symptoms many people faced.
The term “long COVID” was in fact coined by people suffering persistent symptoms after a COVID infection, who were seeking words to describe what they were going through.
The role people with long COVID have played in defining their condition and bringing medical and public attention to it demonstrates the possibilities of patient-led expertise. For decades, people with invisible or “silent” conditions such as ME/CFS (myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome) have had to fight ignorance from health-care professionals and stigma from others in their lives. They have often been told their disabling symptoms are psychosomatic.
Gerrard’s comments, and the media’s amplification of them, repudiates the term “long COVID” that community members have chosen to give their condition an identity and support each other. This is likely to cause distress and exacerbate feelings of abandonment.
The words we use to describe illnesses and conditions are incredibly powerful. Naming a new condition is a step towards better recognition of people’s suffering, and hopefully, better diagnosis, health care, treatment and acceptance by others.
The term “long COVID” provides an easily understandable label to convey patients’ experiences to others. It is well known to the public. It has been routinely used in news media reporting and and in many reputable medical journal articles.
Most importantly, scrapping the label would further marginalise a large group of people with a chronic illness who have often been left to struggle behind closed doors.
Deborah Lupton is affiliated with OzSAGE.
– ref. Why scrapping the term ‘long COVID’ would be harmful for people with the condition – https://theconversation.com/why-scrapping-the-term-long-covid-would-be-harmful-for-people-with-the-condition-225880
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Why are musicians so keen to get played on the radio?
It can’t be because of the money.
In Australia they are paid at rates so low they come close to making streaming services look generous. By law, no radio station can be made to pay no more than 1% of the station’s gross revenue for all of the music it plays, even if it is an all-music station. By the time the labels have had their cut, the artists get a lot less.
Legislation now before the Senate would remove the ceiling, allowing radio stations and the representatives of musical artists to negotiate freely, with a final decision made by a tribunal in cases where they can’t reach agreement.
It’s a bit like the legislation set up to arbitrate disputes between platforms such as Facebook and news organisations about the amount to pay for news.
The parallels tell us an awful lot about where the power lies in disputes between platforms and providers. Here’s a hint: it doesn’t lie with providers, whether they provide music, or news, or, for that matter, fruit to Coles and Woolworths.
Here’s what happened with radio.
Legislation dating back to 1968 has given Australian radio stations a blanket right to play whatever music they want so long as they negotiate a payment rate with the relevant collecting society.
If the station and collecting society can’t agree on the rate, the decision is made by an independent tribunal, but, for commercial stations, the tribunal is limited to awarding no more than 1% of the station’s gross revenue, and for ABC stations, a mere half of one cent per Australian resident per year.
The Attorney General introduced the ceilings to “allay the fears” of radio stations and initially promised a review after five years, a provision he later dropped from the final draft of the legislation. A half a century of inflation has rendered the ABC’s ceiling of half a cent per person worth a fraction of what it was.
The ceilings only apply to radio stations and only to the recordings. Television stations (including ABC stations) pay much more per track.
And composers, who are paid separately with no legislated limit, get much more.
This means the composers of You’re the Voice get paid quite well, but the performer, John Farnham, does not.
The record industry has tried time and time again to remove the ceiling.
In 2010 it even went to the High Court, arguing along the lines of the case depicted in the movie The Castle that the constitution prevented the Commonwealth from acquiring property other than “on just terms”.
The High Court said “no”, finding copyright wasn’t property.
Now, independent Senator David Pocock is trying again.
Pocock’s Fair Pay for Radio Play bill would remove the ceilings, allowing the radio industry and the record industry to negotiate “a fair rate” subject to adjudication by the Copyright Tribunal.
The radio industry says, if that happens, it will play less Australian music. It would also ask to be freed from the legislated requirement to play Australian music.
The recording industry talks as if the radio industry is bluffing.
Annabelle Herd, head of the Phonographic Performance Company of Australia, told the Senate hearing
even if the radio networks stopped playing all Australian music, they would still have to pay to play UK music, Canadian music and music from pretty much every other country in the world.
It’s a point she might not want to push too far.
In 1970 that’s exactly what happened. In response to what it felt was an over-large demand from the Phonographic Performance Company, the commercial radio industry said no, and refused to play any of its music.
Instead, it played records from independent Australian labels who didn’t charge and got their records pressed in Singapore, and American music, lots of it.
While the industry couldn’t play music from the UK, Canada and a bunch of other countries that were signatories to the relevant copyright treaty, it could play music from the United States, which didn’t charge, and wasn’t.
A disc jockey quoted at the time said he didn’t think the average listener would notice, and there’s nothing on record to suggest the average listener did.
The Beatles album Let it Be was released on May 8. The record ban, as it was called, came into force on May 16. The Long and Winding Road cracked the top five just about everywhere it was released, apart from Australia.
Five months later, the record companies caved. The only thing the radio industry offered it was a guaranteed number of advertisements per week. Which had been the radio industry’s point all along. The record companies needed ratio play for exposure. Without it, people were unlikely to buy their discs.
It’s possible to stretch parallels too far, but when Facebook temporarily stopped linking to pieces from Australian news sites in 2021, traffic to those sites slid 13%.
The common theme is that – as unfair as it seems – platforms have an awful lot of power over providers. If Coles and Woolworths say no, fruit growers won’t be able to distribute their product; if radio stations say no, artists won’t be as widely disseminated; and if Facebook and its ilk say no, news sites will get fewer clicks.
Facebook has been paying millions of dollars to Australian news sites since the news media bargaining code began in 2021. In February it said when the agreements expire, it will pay no more.
The code allows the government to force Facebook to pay, but only if it continues to link to news, and it has given every indication it won’t.
Peter Martin is Economics Editor of The Conversation.
– ref. What’ll happen when Facebook stops paying for news? Here’s what happened when radio stopped paying for music – https://theconversation.com/whatll-happen-when-facebook-stops-paying-for-news-heres-what-happened-when-radio-stopped-paying-for-music-226013
]]>It’s been a tumultuous time in politics in recent months, as the new National-led Government has driven through its “First 100 Day programme”. During this period there’s been a handful of opinion polls, which overall just show a minimal amount of flux in public support for the various parties in Parliament – the levels of support for each party are roughly where they were at the last election.
Yet beneath the steady “party vote” numbers are some further polling results that should worry the new National-led administration. It appears that Christopher Luxon’s Government is not receiving the usual “honeymoon” period normally gifted to the fresh faces controlling the Beehive.
The IPSOS poll for February
The most concerning survey result for the Government comes today from the IPSOS polling company, which released its latest “Issues Monitor” report, showing that New Zealanders rate the performance of the new Government at only 4.6 out of 10. You can see the full report here: IPSOS: 23rd Ipsos NZ Issues Monitor Feb 2024
The polling company asked 1000 New Zealanders: “Overall, how would you rate the government for its job in the last 6 months from 0 to 10, where 0 means ‘abysmal’ and 10 means ‘outstanding’?” The 4.6/10 result is the mean average answer.
IPSOS reports that this poor score is very similar to the lows recorded for the last government. The Labour Government received its highest score of 7.6 in July 2020, but by August 2023 it had dropped to 4.5. You can see the changing scores for the various governments, since 2017, in the chart below from the IPSOS report:
What is also interesting is to look at the breakdown of the proportions that gave the Government a high score (7-10/10), a mid-score (4-6/10) or a low score (0-3/10). In the latest survey, 37 per cent of respondents gave a low score, which was the highest proportion since the survey began in July 2017, and the report authors label a “significant” increase. Meanwhile, 30 per cent gave a high score, and 29 per cent gave a mid-score. This suggests a rather polarised electorate.
Political scientist Grant Duncan comments today on the latest result: “We’d normally expect a ‘honeymoon’ boost in a new government’s rating, if only due to people feeling glad about a change. But the Luxon government was mired in controversy even before the coalition agreements were drafted” – see: It’s official: Luxon missed out on a honeymoon
Duncan suggests that the latest poor score might be a result of the Treaty and ethnicity debates of February: “The IPSOS poll was run in late February, after the country had gone through a lot of debate and angst, thanks to ACT’s proposed Treaty bill and to controversial policies such as the disestablishment of the Māori Health Authority”.
Luxon responded to the latest poll today on TVNZ’s Breakfast by saying he was “not too hung up on polls” and he pointed out that “for 15 of the 20 areas of concern raised by New Zealanders in the study, respondents backed the National Party’s ability to deal with them” – see Felix Desmarais’ No honeymoon: Govt performance 4.6 out of 10 so far – poll
The IPSOS survey also showed the following top five issues of concern for the public:
The Talbot Mills poll
Yesterday, the latest Talbot Mills poll result was published by BusinessDesk, showing the following party vote support:
More concerning for the Government was the “preferred PM” result, which had Christopher Luxon on 24 per cent (down 3 points), and only slightly above Chris Hipkins, on 23 per cent. The last National prime minister to perform this poorly was Jenny Shipley, who polled only 22 per cent 26 years ago in 1998 – one year before National lost the election to Helen Clark’s Labour Party.
The mood of the electorate has also soured. When asked if the country is headed in the right or wrong direction, 48 per cent said it was on the “wrong track”, which was up seven percentage points since February. Those who said New Zealand on the “right track” was down three points to only 40 per cent.
This poll was apparently carried out for Talbot Mills’ corporate clients, and wasn’t meant for publication, but you can read about it in Pattrick Smellie’s article, Christopher Luxon struggling to connect: leaked poll (paywalled)
Smellie also reports that “more than two-thirds of those polled named the cost of living as one of their three biggest concerns. That dwarfed the next three worries: health, crime and housing, which were all nominated roughly equally”. Furthermore, “almost three-quarters of voters opposed ‘semi-automatic weapons being made legal again’, at 73%.”
The Taxpayers Union Curia poll
Eleven days ago the Taxpayers Union Curia Poll also came out, which showed some broadly similar results. The Herald’s Thomas Coughlan reported on it: “The mood of the country appears to have soured on the Government. After a couple of months in which more Kiwis felt the country was on the ‘right track’, the right track-wrong track indicator tipped into negatives again, with net 3 per cent of people thinking NZ was on the wrong track. More people disapprove of the Government than approve of it. A net 3.9 per cent of people disapprove of the Government, a shift of 8.4 points on last month’s poll” – see: Latest poll: Christopher Luxon’s popularity crashes after allowance blunder, now trails Chris Hipkins
Also, in terms of Luxon’s favourability, the results were bad news. His net favourability had dropped 16 points to -5 per cent, behind that of Hipkins on +2 per cent. However, the other party leaders in government fared much better, with David Seymour up 6 points to -8 per cent and Winston Peters up 10 points to -22 per cent.
Thomas Coughlan points out that the Curia poll had been carried out at the time that Luxon had endured very negative media coverage over his accommodation entitlement.
Here are the party vote figures:
Also in March, the Roy Morgan poll – which receives less media publicity, due to this Australian company not belonging to the New Zealand agreement on survey methodology – also had broadly similar results, albeit with Labour on even lower figure:
The lack of a honeymoon for the new prime minister was also discussed last month by 1News’ Justin Hu, who has looked at what happened when Helen Clark, John Key and Jacinda Ardern became PM: “Back in 2000, Helen Clark enjoyed a 13-point bump in preferred prime minister polling… Nine years later, following Clark’s defeat, successor John Key rose in support from 40% to 51% as preferred prime minister in the February following the 2008 election… Following the swearing-in of Jacinda Ardern’s 2017 coalition government, she also posted a 10-point lift in her preferred prime minister numbers by the following February” – see: Luxon’s popularity low compared to other first-term PMs
Political scientist Lara Greaves is reported in this article as putting the problem for Luxon mostly down to Winston Peters and David Seymour occupying much of the spotlight since the coalition was formed. She says that having “two very strong deputy prime ministers with quite strong personalities” was affecting the public’s perception of Luxon.
Since then, both Peters and Seymour have only made their presence even stronger and their controversies bigger. It’s hard to see how any of this is going to help Luxon push up his government’s report card above 4.6/10.
Dr Bryce Edwards
Political Analyst in Residence, Director of the Democracy Project, School of Government, Victoria University of Wellington.
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Getty Images/Gerald Corsi
In the latest move to reform environmental laws in New Zealand, the coalition government has introduced a bill to fast-track consenting processes for projects deemed to be of national or regional significance.
The Fast-track Approvals Bill, introduced under urgency on March 7, would take precedence over several current environmental laws and give ministers the power to skirt existing approval processes.
Leaders of ten scientific societies that conduct biodiversity research in Aotearoa New Zealand, representing thousands of members (ourselves included), have called on the government to slow down the pace of reform.
They warn that decision-making criteria are weighted towards
development, not environmental protection or sustainable resource use, and undermine New Zealand’s obligations to protect the country’s unique and threatened biodiversity.
New Zealand’s economy relies on the environment in many ways. One study estimated New Zealand’s land-based ecosystem services contributed NZ$57 billion to human welfare in 2012 (27% of the country’s GDP). This includes services such as crop pollination by insects, erosion control by plants and flood regulation by wetlands.
The fast-track bill requires expert panels to provide recommendations to the relevant ministers within six months of a project being referred to them. This time frame is wholly unsuitable to making proper assessments of environmental impacts, including those on plants and animals, as surveys will likely be conducted at inappropriate times of the year.
A key requirement of assessing impacts on biodiversity is to undertake new ecological surveys of the project site and surrounds. Such surveys identify the threatened species and ecosystems found on the site, catalogue where they are found and estimate their population numbers.
This information is then used to determine how those species and ecosystems could be affected, and whether the project could be modified to avoid or mitigate these impacts.
There are currently no directions in the bill for the expert panel to commission new ecological surveys. However, even if panels could do this, the six-month time frame precludes robust ecological surveys.
Read more:
Without a better plan, New Zealand risks sleepwalking into a biodiversity extinction crisis
Thorough ecological assessments involve conducting surveys at multiple times throughout the year because certain species will only be present during particular seasons.
For instance, reptiles, frogs, invertebrates and migratory species of birds are usually only detectable during warmer times of the year. Surveys for them during winter are unlikely to find these species.
Even certain plants, such as orchids that can lie dormant underground as a tuber, have life cycles that make them difficult to detect. Many grasses are best identified when they are in flower.
In many cases, restricting consenting to just six months means expert panels would have to make their assessments based only on existing ecological information. This is known as a “desktop assessment”.
While a useful first step, these are not a replacement for on-the-ground surveys. This is particularly the case in New Zealand, where we have limited data on many species and for many parts of the country. For example, we don’t have sufficient data on most of New Zealand’s reptiles.
Apart from the proposed fast-tracking of resource consents, the government has already repealed the Natural and Built Environment Act and the Spatial Planning Act. Both were enacted only last year as part of a new resource management regime.
The government also plans to replace the National Policy Statement for Freshwater Management, which provides direction to local authorities on how to manage activities that affect the health of lakes and rivers.
None of the recent and proposed changes to environmental legislation are responsive to the dual biodiversity and climate crises. They are also inconsistent with the government’s own stated goal of evidence-based decision making.
Read more:
Restoring ecosystems to boost biodiversity is an urgent priority – our ‘Eco-index’ can guide the way
New Zealand’s plants, animals, fungi and ecosystems are globally unique. They underpin key economic sectors, especially primary production and tourism. But they are also threatened with extinction.
More than 75% of New Zealand’s native species of reptile, bird, bat and freshwater fish are either threatened with extinction or at risk of becoming threatened.
New Zealand has international obligations to conserve biodiversity under the Convention on Biological Diversity, which was signed in 1993. In 2022, New Zealand joined almost 200 member nations in adopting the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, which commits countries to protect 30% of land and ocean globally by 2030.
Read more:
Despite its green image, NZ has world’s highest proportion of species at risk
Much of New Zealand’s most at-risk indigenous biodiversity is found on private land and may be subject to detrimental impacts from land use and development pressures.
The fast-tracking agenda threatens to undermine New Zealand’s progress on biodiversity protection and other key environmental issues. It erodes rather than sustains the natural capital on which the economy depends.
New Zealand’s scientific societies are urging the coalition government to allow adequate time for appropriate parliamentary select committee processes and thorough public consultation on the bill.
They call for a comprehensive legislative and policy framework, centred on the protection of environmental values and sustainable resource management, to ensure development occurs in ways that don’t further degrade natural capital.
The authors thank Dr Fleur Maseyk for her comments and discussions on this piece.
Tim Curran receives funding from the New Zealand Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE), Fire and Emergency New Zealand, the Hellaby Grasslands Trust, Marlborough District Council, Brian Mason Scientific and Technical Trust, and the Lincoln University Argyle Trust. Tim is the Submissions Coordinator and a past President of the New Zealand Ecological Society, and coordinated and helped draft the open letter to the government referred to in this article.
Jo Monks receives funding from the New Zealand Department of Conservation and Auckland Zoological Park. She is Vice President of the New Zealand Ecological Society and a council member of the Society for Research on Amphibians and Reptiles in New Zealand. Jo is a previous employee of the New Zealand Department of Conservation. Jo signed the open letter to government referred to in this article on behalf of the New Zealand Ecological Society.
– ref. The government wants to fast-track approvals of large infrastructure projects – that’s bad news for NZ’s biodiversity – https://theconversation.com/the-government-wants-to-fast-track-approvals-of-large-infrastructure-projects-thats-bad-news-for-nzs-biodiversity-225790
]]>Uber has argued it does not have as much control over drivers as the unions suggest, and wants a judgment ruling that drivers are employees and not contractors set aside and sent back to the Employment Court.
The 2022 ruling followed a three-week hearing in which four drivers sought to be classified as employees under section 6 of the Employment Relations Act.
They argued Uber’s misclassification of them as contractors denied them the minimum wage, holiday pay, protection from unjust dismissal, KiwiSaver contributions, and the right to unionise and collectively bargain.
The judgment by chief Employment Court judge Christina Inglis, to confirm their claim as employees, threw the gate open for other drivers to then seek the protections of employment law.
But lawyer for Uber Paul Wicks KC told the Court of Appeal on Tuesday Inglis had failed to consider the lack of control Uber had in this relationship.
“Each driver had complete flexibility and choice over when they worked, for how long and where, and that freedom is wholly different to an employment relationship, which is typically structured around a clear obligation to work certain hours.
“They had other work commitments and chose to log on to the Uber app when and where it suited them.”
He said Inglis had also failed to appropriately consider the intention of the drivers when they signed up to work for Uber, arguing drivers knew what they were getting into.
But most importantly, Wicks said Inglis had started in the wrong place – putting too much weight on the drivers’ vulnerability and using this to tip the scales towards them being deemed employees.
“The Employment Relations Act serves a social purpose, but only when limited to employer relationships. The social purpose being to protect employees properly classified, not to protect workers by making them employees.
“The starting point was incorrect. Section 6 of the Act should not be interpreted on a broad basis with a particular emphasis on vulnerability.”
The appeal is defended by unions representing the drivers – First Union and E Tu.
Union lawyer Peter Cranney, who represented the drivers in the Employment Court, said any terms referred to as “freedom” for drivers, were not.
“The actual contractual relationship is that Uber can do what it likes.”
“The most important element is that Uber determines completely the price of the trip. Completely. And in relation to the so-called driver-passenger contract, if there is one, it’s a very strange contract because every aspect of it is decided by Uber not the passenger.
“Everything is determined by someone who is not a party to the contract … and that’s because the contract is a fiction.”
Cranney will continue his submissions tomorrow.
The appeal comes as Parliament also looks to make changes in this space.
Workplace Relations Minister Brooke van Velden recently confirmed her intention to close the door on contractors seeking to be classified an employees.
“This Government wishes to ensure businesses and workers who explicitly agree to a contracting arrangement have certainty about the nature of that relationship,” she told the Auckland Business Chamber earlier this month.
“The legal status quo has created uncertainty for contractors and businesses because of contractors’ ability to challenge their employment status if they believe they should be classified as employees.
“So, I have asked my officials for advice on policy options to increase certainty in contracting relationships. I want to achieve certainty for contracting parties, so that their intent when entering into a contract for services is upheld.”
Early last year, then-Prime Minister Chris Hipkins put work in this space on hold, saying the Government was “deferring” consultation until “all appeals of the case are heard”.
The post Uber fights to have drivers seen as contractors, not employees appeared first on Newsroom.
]]>What can and can’t be purchased by disabled people or their carers has been slashed in an effort by the Ministry of Disabled People Whaikaha to save money.
The purchasing guidelines, a set of rules that sets out what can be purchased using the various streams of Government disability funding, were significantly narrowed in a note issued by Whaikaka out of the blue yesterday.
Disability Issues Minister Penny Simmonds said the ministry was “very close to the end of their appropriation”.
When asked how close she replied: “Days”.
It is forecasting a budget overspend of between $50 million and $65 million for the current year. The changes to purchasing guidelines are not intended to solely plug this gap.
Simmonds described the pause as “temporary”.
“We will sort out the criteria around the use of flexible funding. We’re not saying it will go completely, but we need to pause and sort out [the criteria].
“I think, really, there’s been a swing too far from no flexibility to total flexibility. Now we have to recalibrate and find some middle ground.”
She said under the previous government’s individualised funding policy which loosened the purchasing guidelines, spending doubled.
“That’s put pressure on obviously the amount of money that was there to be able to be used and so now we have to look at how we prioritise that.”
Simmonds said funding going towards purchases that benefitted carers needed to be “pulled back and prioritised to the disabled person”.
Frian Wadia is the mother of three boys with a range of disabilities and needs.
She said the changes were shocking and disappointing.
“As a parent of children who uses individualised funding, respite care support, personal care and also as a community advocate… just seeing and hearing from parents at the moment is distressing, it’s causing a lot of anxiety for our families.”
Equipment includes items such as a tablet or iPad, sensory or fidget items, or a trampoline.
Wadia said for many people having these items was the difference between the carer getting any semblance of respite during the day or night.
“A lot of families who have autistic children for example and their child has a lot of anxiety and they cannot stay with somebody else… for those families, being able to purchase things like and iPad or device, things like Lego and sensory furniture and play equipment, all of that kind of stuff is now not allowed, which means parents have to be 24/7 with their kids.
“They’re not able to purchase anything that allows the child to stay occupied or engaged in a meaningful way.”
The changes also impact on things like a transport allowance for support workers or the disabled person themselves, massages or therapeutic purchases for the carer – bearing in mind some carers have a hugely physical role in lifting, changing, showering or transporting a large disabled adult.
The changes were announced on Whaikaha’s website and shared on social media.
Hundreds of comments were quickly made on the posts, all decrying the decision and the lack of consultation.
“This right here is absolutely disgusting. You are stopping my child and others like him from accessing therapy they desperately need. They are declined by the public system not because they don’t need these services but because the public system is so under resourced they cannot take them on. It’s just absolutely vile and completely against the UN Convention, the Bill of Rights and EGL [Enabling Good Lives]. I am absolutely livid. You best believe we will be fighting this,” one person wrote.
Another described the changes as “cruel”.
“So it just makes the funding pointless for a lot of people. Virtually everything that would’ve been of use for my child will no longer be available and given that we (as with many other parents/carers of disabled people) need this to adequately provide our kids with the best supports and opportunities for success will just miss out. This Government talks about getting more people out working and those that are able gaining independence, but then they pull the rug out from under them making the access to items that would help them gain this independence impossible to access. I mean, I didn’t expect much from this Government but this is just cruel.”
National Enabling Good Lives chair Jade Farrar found out about the changes yesterday when they went public.
“In 2021 there was a Cabinet decision around the establishment of Whaikaha and as part of those Cabinet decisions Whaikaha was asked to operate differently in regard to partnering with communities, specifically disabled people and families. Whaikaha did not partner with any sector leaders on this decision.
“NEGL had no involvement in the decisions that were taken or the budgeting arrangements and we were given no prior notice any different to the public… The disability community is full of very highly skilled, well-informed people that would have been able to support around solutions to this problem and we were not involved.”
Enabling Good Lives holds a vision that disabled people and families can bring about positive change when they have control over resources (e.g. personal budgets with options of how these are managed), access to an independent ally, access to resources to build regional and national leadership and investment in disabled people, families and their communities.
The National Enabling Good Lives Leadership Group provides high-level strategic advice to assist community and government initiatives to align with the approach.
The ministry has promised to transform the disability system in line with Enabling Good Lives principles.
Labour’s disability issues spokesperson Priyanca Radhakrishnan said taking flexibility and choice away from disabled people and their carers was unacceptable and contravened the Enabling Good Lives principles.
“Nicola Willis has said there will be no cuts to frontline services. This is a clear cut to frontline services. They are disguising it as an area that is potentially overspent that they need to sort of pull back on [and] they will say that there are no funding cuts per se because the quantum of funding is not reduced, but by severely limiting what people can access – that is a cut.”
She said it also remained murky around what exactly might be in – and out – under the new guidelines.
“It’s not terribly clear what’s in what’s out and that is the concern that many parents have.”
Carers have long argued they should be paid a fair wage for the work they do, and have better access to respite.
Infometrics analysis based off data from the 2018 Census estimated there were 432,000 unpaid carers in New Zealand – one in seven adults, but that this was likely an undercount.
“Unpaid carers make sacrifices. In addition to the day-to-day costs of caring such as food, fuel and other expenses, the time unpaid carers spend caring is time they are unable to spend at work, studying, at leisure, or looking after their own health,” the report said.
“Reduced ability to work results in lost earnings and lost KiwiSaver contributions. Furthermore, the broader effects of lost leisure and respite result in a loss of wellbeing.”
Estimates are that about $1.5 billion in income each year was lost to people who were undertaking the unpaid care work instead.
The Supported Living Payment for family carers is $384.92 per week for those eligible. For 24/7 carers, that equates to $2.29 per hour.
Family carers are allocated a maximum of 14 days annually at a rate of $75 per day for respite care to let them have a break from caring – yet finding somewhere with space avalible is difficult and often there are waitlists.
Simmonds said she would be speaking with Whaikaha about how their announcements were made.
Whaikaha has been approached for comment.
The post Disability Ministry ‘days’ away from spending all its money appeared first on Newsroom.
]]>The band has asked their record label to issue a cease and desist to stop the NZ First leader using their 1997 hit to support his ‘misguided political views’.
“I get knocked down, but I get up again,” blared through the speakers on Sunday as Winston Peters took the stage at the Palmerston North Convention Centre. Then the NZ First leader delivered a state of the nation speech where he compared co-governance to Nazi Germany, talked about plans to remove gender and sexuality lessons from the school curriculum and said that NZ First and their supporters have a “real chance to take back our country”.
He finished by paraphrasing the song he’d walked on stage to – 1997 hit ‘Tubthumping’ by British anarchist punk band Chumbawamba: “We got knocked down, but we got up again – and nothing is going to stop us now.”
It’s not the first time Peters has referenced ‘Tubthumping’. Launching NZ First’s election campaign in July last year, he warned members to steel for the slinging of dirt: “Just repeat to yourself the words of Chumbawamba: ‘I get knocked down. But I get up again. You’re never gonna keep me down.’”
But Peters’ fondness for Chumbawamba is not reciprocated. Asked for comment by The Spinoff on the use of ‘Tubthumping’, the band said they had not given permission, and had asked their record company Sony to issue a cease and desist notice requiring Peters to “stop using it to try to shore up his misguided political views”.
In a statement, Boff Whalley, formerly the lead guitarist, said, ‘Tubthumping’ was written “as a song of hope and positivity, so it seems entirely odd that the ‘I get knocked down…’ refrain is being used by New Zealand’s deputy prime minister Winston Peters as he barks his divisive, small-minded, bigoted policies during his recent speeches”.
Chumbawamba, who were active from 1982 to 2012, were openly anarcho-communists, following a far leftwing political ideology that rejects the authority of governments. They played benefit shows at miner strikes, picket lines, anti-war events and aligned themselves with Marxism, feminism, gay liberation, class struggle and anti-fascism. At the 1998 Brit Awards, in protest at the Labour government’s refusal to support the Liverpool dockworkers’ strike, band member Danbert Nobacon poured a jug of water over UK deputy prime minister John Prescott, who was in the audience.
While ostensibly a simple, catchy drinking song, ‘Tubthumping’, which was Chumbawamba’s biggest hit by far, has been described as “a Trojan horse designed to covertly deliver anarcho-communism to the masses”.
It’s not the first time the band has stepped in to ask a controversial politician to stop using ‘Tubthumping’. In 2011, Nigel Farage, the leader of British rightwing populist party Ukip, appeared on stage at a conference in England as the song played, which prompted band member Dunstan Bruce to say, “I am absolutely appalled that this grubby little organisation are stealing our song to use for their own ends. It’s beyond the pale and if they use it again we will consider legal action.” A spokesperson for Ukip said the party would stop using the song.
In New Zealand, standard public performance music licences typically held by venues don’t cover the use of music at political events, if that music is used in a way that suggests an affiliation with a political party. Written approval from both the songwriter and recording artists must be attained beforehand, otherwise there is a risk of infringing copyright. This would also address a “Moral Rights Risk” in the Copyright Act 1994, where using music in a way that the artist considers “detrimental to their honour or reputation” may breach their moral rights.
Chumbawamba join a number of artists who in recent years have publicly and legally opposed the use of their music by politicians. Neil Young opposed his music being used by Donald Trump, as did Adele, Rihanna, and the list goes on. Here in New Zealand, when the National Party used a track called ‘Eminem Esque’ that sounded remarkably similar to Eminem’s ‘Lose Yourself’ in an election campaign ad in 2014, Eminem pursued them and won NZ$600,000 in damages.
Whalley said the band would like to remind Peters that the song was written “for and about ordinary people and their resilience”. Tub-thumper is British slang for aggressive political protesting. The song was inspired by Whalley’s neighbour who drunkenly struggled to open his front door while singing ‘Danny Boy’ one night. Eventually, he got in, and the song became about perseverance. Whalley says the song is “not about rich politicians trying to win votes by courting absurd conspiracy theories and spouting misguided racist ideologies”.
]]>Food rationing is underway in remote areas in Papua New Guinea’s Highlands following torrential rain and flash flooding.
More than 20 people have been reported dead in Chimbu Province.
In nearby Enga Province, the centre of last month’s massacre, a 15-year-old boy has been swept away in flooding.
Wapenamanda community leader Aquila Kunzie told RNZ Pacific his village alone was housing almost 100 displaced women and children from the tribal warfare.
As bad weather hampers food production, the need for aid is critical, Kunzie said.
“The massacre has claimed any lives. As the days go by . . . the government is taking the initiative to call for peace negotiations that are ongoing at the moment,” he said.
“The situation is [that] we are feeling the impact of short supply and food rations in the village.
“We are being neglected due to probably bad politics,” Kunzie said.
Kunzie spoke to RNZ Pacific from Mambisanda village mission station where he said the mighty Timin River was only 15m walking distance.
“Constant continuous rainfall in Wapenamanda district has caused rivers to flood,” Kunzie said, adding “food gardens have been washed away”.
A grade eight student has was reportedly washed away, Kunzie said.
“We couldn’t find him due to the heavy flood. The boy is about 15-years-old,” he said.
Woman mutilated
On top of flooding, The National is reporting a woman has been found dead in Wapenamanda despite a ceasefire being agreed to by warring factions.
“It has also been reported maybe the rascals people must have raped her and wounded her and threw her helpless on the road and she was found in the morning,” Kunzie said.
While the woman was found on the road in another village to where Kunzie is, his village is housing “almost 100” victims of tribal warfare.
But with so many mouths to feed and food crops damaged by heavy rains food rationing is in place.
“Only one meal per day, we can’t afford breakfast and lunch with all of them.”
“We say drink only water and stay and have one meal and go to bed and wait for the next day.”
The bad weather has hampered the growth of food and that is becoming a “very critical issue”, Kunzie said.
He said calls for help have fallen on deaf ears.
“We have no way to call out for help,” he said.
This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.
Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz
]]>After months of debate and intrigue, the AFL’s 19th and newest team, the Tasmania Devils, finally launched its jumper, logo and colours in Devonport this week.
The Devils will wear green, yellow and red, and their guernsey will feature a map of Tasmania with a central red “T”. The club’s logo features a profile of a Tasmanian devil, which chair Grant O’Brien said represented the state’s “proud, tough, determined” characters.
Were there any surprises in the branding? None. Perfectly on brand and what has largely been seen already from Tasmania’s junior state teams.
The difference though was this was the official AFL launch. No turning back. And it had cleared some fairly big hurdles such as reaching an agreement with global entertainment giant Warner Bros over the use of the name, colours and logo.
But why was this day so important?
Read more:
The case for a Tasmanian AFL team, from an economist’s point of view
Sport has always been the original crowd funding model. Without fans, there is no team, really. So it was great to see the Devils have been saintly with their marketing to their base – namely the $10 foundation membership.
Within two hours of the launch, the Devils had sold more than 40,000 foundation memberships at $10 a pop. For comparison, the AFL’s most recent expansion clubs, Gold Coast and Greater Western Sydney, totalled 23,359 and 33,036 members respectively at the end of 2023.
Selling cheap foundation memberships several years ahead of the team’s first game was smart, as it gets some nice hard cash rolling in until match-day revenue and sponsorships arrive.
Next, they gain access to a large database, so critical in breaking down members into different segments, and then tailoring an offering to each.
And of course there is the engagement aspect, which for the Devils is particularly important as both the stadium and team are several years away from AFL action – the club is set to enter the national competition in 2028.
They need to keep these foundation members, these key supporters, engaged to keep word of mouth high. And these members aren’t just in Tasmania – they are going to be found everywhere. The team will only play half its games at home, so it is going to need supporters at games played outside the state. The AFL needs this as well.
It helps that these supporters can call themselves foundation members forever. Powerful word of mouth and nice branding. And 50,000+ in a few short hours says the market agrees.
The Devils though must focus on retaining those initial members during what will be a long journey before they play their first game at Macquarie Point.
Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo are the benchmarks in world sport for why details matter in sports marketing. Think “CR7” and you think of only one person. And what kid would say no to a Messi number 10 jersey?
Both bring in tens of millions per year for their franchise in merchandise and ticket sales.
The biggest sporting brands on earth, such as Barcelona FC, manage every single detail of their brand image down to the actual colour shade on all brand offerings.
It’s the same for the Devils, not least because of Warner Bros, but also to avoid the Port Adelaide v Collingwood jersey issue.
The Devils offering had to be unique to every other brand in the AFL, but also use colours in the logo and character which would deepen resonance between team, supporters, and community.
The colours of myrtle green, primrose yellow, and rose red do exactly that. That mix and variations are all theirs. They are representative of the colours of Tasmania, and have been used extensively by many other sporting teams from the state. Consistency is so important in sports marketing and this was great to see.
These colours will help drive deeper emotional responses to the brand, and keep supporters engaged at the highest level, thereby helping to attract sponsors.
As for the brand logo, there was no other choice than the Tasmanian devil, and it’s a great one. Nearly every other AFL team builds much of their branding around their character and this is something the Devils need to do sooner and not later.
The initial public reaction was almost overwhelmingly positive, and allows the Devils to build that core base of supporters who will fill 23,000 seats every home game.
There will be challenges the brand can’t control, such as the rising concern over concussion and the growth of competitors such as basketball, e-sports and soccer. These may impact the brand but overall will be handled by the AFL itself.
Locally, the brand has to focus on providing as many touch-point experiences as possible, such as meet and greets or merchandise days. Tangibility adds value to sports brands in ways most other brands envy.
And this will help keep the brand community active and vocal, which will help deflect any political challenges to the covered stadium, but also attract other supporters, sponsors and community to the team the closer the start date gets.
With the Devil out of the bag, the challenge for the club will now be to ensure it doesn’t veer too much out of its territory and lose sight of just how hard and long it is going to take before its real prey: that one day in September at the MCG.
Andrew Hughes does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
– ref. Devil in the details: breaking down the branding of the AFL’s newest team – https://theconversation.com/devil-in-the-details-breaking-down-the-branding-of-the-afls-newest-team-226010
]]>Brannavan Gnanalingam reviews the debut novel by Saraid de Silva.
One of the most baffling things for children who move to a new country is what their parents’ (or grandparents’) lives were like prior to moving – for kids in particular, they’re too busy trying to fit in in their new country to care all that much. And, as is often the case, by the time such kids are interested in their parents’ stories, it’s too late to ask those stories. It’s almost an unknowable gap for immigrant kids; that, on top of the shock of realising that our parents are human (which most kids have to go through) it’s the realisation that our parents had distinct lives in places we would never understand. In short, our parents contain multitudes, as well.
Saraid de Silva’s AMMA uses this unknowability as a starting point in her tale of three generations of Indian and Sri Lankan women. The first generation is Josephina, an Indian woman, originally from Pondicherry, who is living in 1950s Singapore with her parents, only for her family to betray her in horrendous ways – it leads her to escape to post-independence Sri Lanka. Her daughter Sithara tries to make her way in 1980s Invercargill and Dunedin. Her mother Josephina has closed up following the death of Sithara’s father, the family having moved over to Aotearoa for his medical career. Sithara and her brother Suri navigate a hostile (to put it mildly) environment in Southland. Sithara shifts to Otago for university, falling intensely into a relationship with Paul. Meanwhile, the third strand of her narrative follows her daughter, Annie, who has just arrived at Suri’s doorstep in London. She’s more sure of herself within a local context, but estranged from her mother after her nomadic childhood and her mother’s on-again, off-again relationship with the violent Paul (who’s been in and out of jail for domestic violence).
There is an annoying tendency in books that jump temporally to hold back information, and therefore use that withholding to gerrymander a climax. In AMMA, de Silva avoids that pitfall, and does not rely on that to create her narrative or build narrative momentum. Right from the outset, de Silva lays bare the traumatic events of her three characters’ lives. We learn of Josephina’s horrible treatment from her parents, Sithara’s desperation to be accepted within a Pākehā environment, and Annie’s confusion at the life she can’t quite figure out, let alone the information that she’s all too conscious of having been withheld from her.
The book uses the time differences thematically instead, to create a literal barrier between the three generations’ lives – because their key moments occur separately from the others, the three characters never actually fully come to understand each other. The thrust of the book becomes the extent to which the three of them can come to peace with each other’s flaws, while also highlighting the horrors or guilt that have shaped them. The book ultimately focuses on how people come to find themselves, despite what they – and their parents – go through.
It isn’t too blunt to say that the three women’s stories are stories of survival in spite of the men around them. Heteronormative narratives and/or misogynist men do their best to ruin the protagonists’ lives, and you see the real damage that has been done to them by generations of entitled men. Wider societal narratives also feed their way into the mix – arranged marriages among South Asian families, homophobia, sectarian violence in Sri Lanka, and Aotearoa’s struggle to acknowledge domestic violence are part of the structuring forces that affect the characters’ lives, but de Silva holds the narrative close to examine the effects on her protagonists rather than make grand sweeping statements.
In some respect the narrative is a reactive response to horrible behaviour. AMMA is a tribute to the ways in which women persist, and the way they can help each other. It’s somewhat telling that the female solidarity in the book skips a generation – Annie has a real affinity with Josephina (despite Josephina’s own mistakes), while Josephina has an intense bond with her own grandmother. The women belatedly learn from their own mistakes, and are able to help their granddaughters (you’d hope a similar process would occur for Sithara). AMMA is, also, in part a tribute to queer desire and the way her characters can also desire men who refuse to buy into such behaviour, creating this clear sense that it doesn’t simply have to be this way – there are indeed alternatives. However, the tragedy of the narrative is the extent to which people can’t escape the wider societal failings.
AMMA jumps between Singapore, Sri Lanka, Southland, Dunedin, Hamilton and London. This geographical dislocation matches the way the narrative and time works in the book – further adding to the unknowability that the characters find themselves in. There’s also a real sense of having to start all over again, all of the time, of never being able to find oneself settled. This is a common feeling for immigrants, particularly those of a diasporic background without a clear idea of what “home” is.
What really elevates the book is de Silva’s ability to put the reader within a specific location. This was crucial in a book that is so geographically unstable; what appears disorienting is typical of many South Asian immigrant experiences. de Silva has a real knack for being able to set a scene by focusing on impressionistic details that add depth to the various locations in the book. This is contained in a line about Invercargill’s wind or ice, description of a high-school party in Christchurch, or a brief moment of freedom in a Singaporean field. This perhaps is helped by de Silva’s background in radio and television, in which she clearly knows how to set a scene without taking away momentum or needing to rely on a clumsy metaphor instead. There’s a real genius in de Silva’s control of place, and the way she deploys this to ground her characters temporally – and historically.
What is obvious in AMMA is the way immigrants have to compartmentalise their lives geographically. That becomes potentially inscrutable when the reasons for one leaving are so traumatic, and that makes it that much harder for their children to understand the reason why their parents are the way they are. What’s clear from AMMA though is the way that these various histories never get revealed coherently or in a linear fashion. Instead they’re revealed in spurts or whispers. To de Silva’s credit, she’s written this book to be taken on its own terms, she never requires her own characters to justify themselves to the reader – only to themselves.
The characters in AMMA themselves cross boundaries – ethnically, sexually, and geographically. Nothing ever is really stable, despite the way people have a one-dimensional view of their parents, and the generations ahead of them. Maybe that’s where the real poignancy of the title comes in. AMMA, in all caps, means mother in many South Asian languages, but specifically in both Sinhalese and Tamil. The title hints at the misplaced and fixed view of the person who is responsible for their existence. The real sadness of AMMA, and its undoubted brilliance, is the way in which it depicts how those of us who are immigrants will never know the complexities, traumas and mistakes of where we actually come from, but that we have no choice but to try to figure it out anyway.
AMMA by Saraid de Silva ($38, Moa Press) is available for purchase from Unity Books Wellington and Auckland.
]]>
Narelle Portanier/Binge
“If you don’t know who your mob are, you don’t know who you are,” Detective Andrea “Andie” Whitford (played by Leah Purcell) is told early into the new crime series High Country.
Andie has recently arrived in the lush remote Victorian High Country with her partner Helen Hartley (Sara Wiseman), both trying to put traumas behind them as they start afresh.
Driving along a snaking winding road, Andie finds an isolated Mercedes Benz car. The driver’s door is wide open and the owner has left valuables behind, including keys and wallet.
Doctor Haber (Francis Greenslade) is another in a line of missing persons who have disappeared mysteriously into the rural mountain wilderness.
New in town and without the experience of other local police, Andie – to the decry of her colleagues – is assigned the case of solving a murder and disappearance of two locals that has the agitated town wanting answers.
From the opening of this new eight-part series on Binge, High Country feels in steady hands helped by the well-seasoned cast of familiar Australian crime genre actors. Purcell (previously seen in Wentworth Prision) is joined by Aaron Pedersen (Mystery Road), Nicholas Bell (Scrublands), Henry Nixon (The Kettering Incident), Geoff Morrell (Deep Water) and the versatile Northern Irish actor Ian McElhinney.
High Country was created and written by Marcia Gardner and John Ridley whose background includes scripting Australian network crime shows Wentworth Prison and Stingers. They are joined by Wentworth Prision director Kevin Carlin, who directs five of the eight episodes.
With this experience, Gardner, Ridley and Carlin have created a well-plotted and suspenseful procedural crime series that never loses pace or focus. An effective cliff hanger ends each episode making this a very binge-worthy show.
High Country sits within the tradition of uniformed middle-aged female police officers, most notably Jodie Foster in the recent series of True Detective: Night Country and Sarah Lancashire in Happy Valley.
Similar to these series, Andie’s own past comes back to haunt her, forcing her to confront the very thing that she was trying to flee. High Country equally deals with the issues and frustrations of women having to navigate themselves through the gender politics of a male-dominated workforce.
Read more:
True Detective: Night Country’s indigenous representation offers hope for decolonising television
Despite High Country arriving in a packed market of quality crime television and the show always playing within the tropes of the crime genre (dirty cops, historical town secrets, wrongly accused victims) there is enough nuance for it never to feel predictable or cliched.
An important reason for this is Purcell’s captivating performance, equally convincing in the sensitive domestic scenes with her partner and wayward teenager daughter, contrasted against dealing with the white, male, toxic thugs who think they run the town.
High Country possesses a vastness that allows ample opportunity for contemplation. The viewer is invited to delve into the intricacies of the setting and its characters. The writing and cinematography are multi-dimensional, offering depth and complexity that encourages reflection and engagement at each turn.
The line “if you don’t know who your mob are, you don’t know who you are” is repeated across the series. It also becomes the very thing that Andie must investigate in order to solve the crime.
In the rich tapestry of Australian crime fiction – and as its title would suggest – High Country adds to the rise of what has been dubbed “outback” or “rural” noir, sharing similarity with other recent Australian series such as Scrublands and Mystery Road.
A localised theme emerging through Australian rural noir is the Indigenous detective at the centre of the narrative. This is true of TV shows Mystery Road and High Country and also present in literary rural crime noir such as Julie Janson’s Madukka: The River Serpent (2022), an outback crime novel told from the perspective of a Aboriginal sleuth in her 50s.
Taking place in the Victorian Alps, High Country was filmed in the region that served as the backdrop for Robert Connelly’s latest feature film, Force of Nature: The Dry 2, which also deals with people missing in the Victorian wilderness.
Set in the close-knit community, the narrative tackles climate change, domestic violence, and Indigenous identity and land possession. Garner and Ridley paint a vivid picture of the ethical and societal ramifications of these challenges on rural populations.
High Country presents a poignant and impactful exploration of environmental crises and domestic turmoil that has every potential to resonate with a broad mainstream streaming audience.
High Country is on Binge from today.
Read more:
‘You rarely see abuse directed at men’: a look at the sexist abuse women police officers face online
Stephen Gaunson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
– ref. Led by Leah Purcell’s captivating performance, High Country delivers fresh take on Australian rural noir – https://theconversation.com/led-by-leah-purcells-captivating-performance-high-country-delivers-fresh-take-on-australian-rural-noir-225890
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Today, almost a quarter of Australians are digitally excluded. This means they miss out on the social, educational and economic benefits online connectivity provides.
In the face of this ongoing “digital divide”, countries are now talking about a future of inclusive artificial intelligence (AI).
However, if we don’t learn from current problems with digital exclusion, it will likely spill over into people’s future experiences with AI. That’s the conclusion from our new research published in the journal AI and Ethics.
The digital divide is a well-documented social schism. People on the wrong side of it face difficulties when it comes to accessing, affording, or using digital services. These disadvantages significantly reduce their quality of life.
Decades of research have provided us with a rich understanding of who is most at risk. In Australia, older people, those living in remote areas, people on lower incomes and First Nations peoples are most likely to find themselves digitally excluded.
Zooming out, reports show that one-third of the world’s population – representing the poorest countries – remains offline. Globally, the digital gender divide also still exists: women, particularly in low and middle-income countries, face substantially more barriers to digital connectivity.
During the COVID pandemic, the impacts of digital inequity became much more obvious. As large swathes of the world’s population had to “shelter in place” – unable to go outside, visit shops, or seek face-to-face contact – anyone without digital access was severely at risk.
Consequences ranged from social isolation to reduced employment opportunities, as well as a lack of access to vital health information. The UN Secretary-General stated in 2020 that “the digital divide is now a matter of life and death”.
As with most forms of exclusion, the digital divide functions in multiple ways. It was originally defined as a gap between those who have access to computers and the internet and those who do not. But research now shows it’s not just an issue of access.
Having little or no access leads to reduced familiarity with digital technology, which then erodes confidence, fuels disengagement, and ultimately sets in motion an intrinsic sense of not being “digitally capable”.
As AI tools increasingly reshape our workplaces, classrooms and everyday lives, there is a risk AI could deepen, rather than narrow, the digital divide.
To assess the impact of digital exclusion on people’s experiences with AI, in late 2023 we surveyed a representative selection of hundreds of Australian adults. We began by asking them to rate their confidence with digital technology.
We found digital confidence was lower for women, older people, those with reduced salaries, and those with less digital access.
We then asked these same people to comment on their hopes, fears and expectations of AI. Across the board, the data showed that people’s perceptions, attitudes and experiences with AI were linked to how they felt about digital technology in general.
In other words, the more digitally confident people felt, the more positive they were about AI.
Read more:
Giving AI direct control over anything is a bad idea – here’s how it could do us real harm
To build truly inclusive AI, these findings are important to consider for several reasons. First, they confirm that digital confidence is not a privilege shared by all.
Second, they show us digital inclusion is about more than just access, or even someone’s digital skills. How confident a person feels in their ability to interact with technology is important too.
Third, they show that if we don’t contend with existing forms of digital exclusion, they are likely to spill over into perceptions, attitudes and experiences with AI.
Currently, many countries are making headway in their efforts to reduce the digital divide. So we must make sure the rise of AI doesn’t slow these efforts, or worse still, exacerbate the divide.
While there is a slew of associated risks, when deployed responsibly, AI can make significant positive impacts on society. Some of these can directly target issues of inclusivity.
For example, computer vision can track the trajectory of a tennis ball during a match, making it audible for blind or low-vision spectators.
AI has been used to analyse online job postings to help boost employment outcomes in under-represented populations such as First Nations peoples. And, while they’re still in the early stages of development, AI-powered chatbots could increase accessibility and affordability of medical services.
But this responsible AI future can only be delivered if we also address what keeps us digitally divided. To develop and use truly inclusive AI tools, we first have to ensure the feelings of digital exclusion don’t spill over.
This means not only tackling pragmatic issues of access and infrastructure, but also the knock-on effects on people’s levels of engagement, aptitude and confidence with technology.
Sarah Bentley works for CSIRO, which receives funding from the Australian Government.
Claire Naughtin works for CSIRO, which receives funding from the Australian Government.
– ref. The ‘digital divide’ is already hurting people’s quality of life. Will AI make it better or worse? – https://theconversation.com/the-digital-divide-is-already-hurting-peoples-quality-of-life-will-ai-make-it-better-or-worse-222987
]]>It’s commonly accepted that women do the vast majority of caregiving in Australian society. But less appreciated is that Indigenous women do larger amounts of unpaid care than any other group.
Working with the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner’s office, we worked with more than 100 Indigenous women across Australia to talk about their interpretations and experiences of care.
“Mainstream” definitions and measures of care do not include the vast and complex ways care is defined by First Nations women. This includes care not only for people, but for communities, Country and culture.
It means important work goes unrecognised, uncompensated or misunderstood, leading to the marginalisation of this crucial work and the women who do it.
The Australian Human Rights Commission’s Wiyi Yani U Thangani report illuminates the crucial importance of the care provided by First Nations women. Our work follows and builds on this report.
An Indigenous woman from the East Kimberley told us:
Well, care for me, as an Indigenous person, is not just caring for your family, it’s caring for your Country.
Another woman from the ACT told us care is a disposition, and a means of respecting culture and heritage:
[Care is] enveloped in everything we do and everything we are and everything about where we are going and paying homage again to our ancestors and who’s come before us. That’s what care is.
This notion of care as a strength is an important insight from the women in this study. However, unpaid care is often unrecognised and undervalued in Australian policy, which while prioritising getting women into employment, has neglected funding and supporting the existing unpaid care work that women do.
What is evident from our study is that Indigenous women want more support for the care work they do, as well as better care services largely within Aboriginal community-controlled organisations to assist them in doing it.
Women frequently linked their demanding care loads to ongoing colonisation, which continues to create damage to the lives of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. A woman from greater Sydney said:
It’s colonial […] It’s just not being able to do things in the way we should be doing them […] because of the colonial structure and things like that.
This includes the impacts of colonisation on gender roles, child removals, incarceration rates, poor health, poverty, racism and more.
It also includes the impacts of state institutions set up to “care”, but which are often uncaring and may be violent and harmful.
Ultimately, this requires Indigenous people’s care to heal, adding extra demands on existing care loads.
Many of the women interviewed in this study were also tired, and often carers needed care too. Some were in, or had been through, periods of utter exhaustion and illness due to trying to carry their stressful care load. A Central Australian woman told us:
It’s hard. It’s draining. Every day just exhausted. Sometimes there’s days when I just can’t keep up with it. And I don’t want to listen, just go away. But those are days when they really need help. So yeah, it’s very exhausting.
Our research also included a time-use survey, which showed that all unpaid care activities accounted for, on average, 62% of our participant women’s time on a usual weekday (about 14.8 hours per day on average), with 48% of their time (around 11.5 hours) spent caring for others and/or caring for Country and culture specifically.
Because (lost) remuneration for this work was raised as a crucial point by Indigenous women during our interviews, we also calculated the approximate market value of this unpaid care work through using hourly award rates for corresponding care activities (sometimes called the replacement method, which understands the cost of this work in the paid market).
The estimated economic value of this work ranged between $223.01 and $457.39 per day (representing an estimated annual salary of between $81,175.64 and $118,921.40). This estimation is conservative as it does not include the multitasking of more than one care activity at the one time.
The estimation raises important questions as to what is owed to Indigenous women, not just because the economy free-rides on unpaid care, but also because much of this care work mops up the mess of colonisation.
Many of the women we spoke to also talked about how unpaid care and paid employment interact.
In addition to their unpaid care roles, most women in paid employment in this study had roles in the community sector which put them at the frontline of caring for community. They saw this work as part of their broader commitment to supporting their families, communities and advancing Indigenous peoples. It is therefore hard to draw a line for these women between paid and unpaid work, meaning it is rare to be able to “switch off”.
Often, employers didn’t realise the amount of unpaid care of this type women do in their paid work roles, even though this actually makes their paid employment successful. Women are also not paid adequately for these valuable skills.
Our research follows generations of Indigenous women who have long shown the strength of care, but also looks at how settler society makes this work harder.
This research underlines the importance of a new approach to supporting Indigenous women, in which their voices, ideas and needs are central, and where care is placed at the heart. This is different to just “fitting” Indigenous care into various settler models, policies and measures already in circulation.
Elise Klein receives funding from the Gender Institute at the Australian National University. She is a member of the Anti-Poverty Centre, the Accountable Income Management Network and a Co-Director of the Australian Basic Income Lab.
Chay Brown receives funding from the Office of Gender Equity and Diversity at the Northern Territory Government. She is affiliated with ANU, Tangentyere Council, and Her Story Mparntwe.
Kayla Glynn-Braun is a First Nation Wiradjuri Women whom is a project coordinator at The Equality Institute and Co-Foundered Her Story Consulting and lead on U Right Sis? project, Indigenous Knowledge
Janet Hunt and Zoe Staines do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
– ref. ‘Care is in everything we do and everything we are’: the work of Indigenous women needs to be valued – https://theconversation.com/care-is-in-everything-we-do-and-everything-we-are-the-work-of-indigenous-women-needs-to-be-valued-225780
]]>Joe Biden and Donald Trump have both secured their parties’ nominations for the November 5 United States general election by winning a majority of all delegates to their parties’ conventions, including delegates not yet allocated.
Both Biden and Trump won their nominations easily, with Biden taking 86.4% of the national Democratic primary vote in contests so far, far ahead of the next closest Marianne Williamson with 3.4%.
In the Republican contest, Trump defeated Nikki Haley by 73.4–23.1 in the national popular vote, with the winner takes all/most rules that apply for most Republican contests further benefitting him in delegates.
Conventions that formally elect the nominees will be held in July (for Republicans) and August (Democrats). If either Trump or Biden withdrew prior to the convention, delegates bound to that candidate would need to be persuaded to vote for another candidate. It could be messy to replace either Trump or Biden as the nominee.
By the November 5 general election, Biden will be almost 82 and Trump 78. In the FiveThirtyEight aggregates, Biden’s net approval is -16.8, with 55.4% disapproving and 38.6% approving. Trump’s net favourability is -9.7, with 52.5% unfavourable and 42.8% favourable. Recently both Biden’s and Trump’s ratings have dipped, with Biden’s March 7 State of the Union address making no difference.
Biden’s net approval is worse than for any other president at this stage of their presidency since scientific polling began in Harry Truman’s presidency (1945–53). John F. Kennedy and Gerald Ford were not president for as long as Biden has been.
There isn’t yet a FiveThirtyEight aggregate for general election polls, but, while there are three recent national polls that give Biden one-to-two point leads, the large majority of national polls have Trump ahead, usually by low single-digit margins.
The national popular vote does not decide the presidency. Instead, there are 538 Electoral Votes distributed among the states based mostly on population, and it takes 270 to win. In my previous US politics article in December, I said that this system would probably favour Trump more than the national popular vote margin.
Read more:
US elections 2024: a Biden vs Trump rematch is very likely, with Trump leading Biden
US consumer sentiment surged from 61.3 points in November to 79 in January, the highest it has been since July 2021. In the next two months, consumer sentiment has fallen back a little to 76.5 in March.
The big gains in consumer sentiment were probably due to reduced inflation. However, the latest economic data suggests inflation is increasing again.
Despite the large gain in consumer sentiment, Biden’s ratings in the FiveThirtyEight aggregate have scarcely changed since my December article. This is bad for Biden, as it implies there is something else wrong other than economic sentiment; his age is the obvious answer.
In December I said the two main chances for a Biden revival were improved economic confidence and Trump being convicted. Economic confidence has improved, but without lifting Biden. On the legal front, Trump’s criminal trials all face delays that may push them back until after the election.
The Supreme Court on March 4 unanimously overturned a Colorado court’s decision, so Trump will be on the ballot paper in all states in November.
In the February US jobs report, the unemployment rate increased 0.2% from January to 3.9%. While there were 275,000 jobs created in February, there were large downward revisions to job gains in December and January, resulting in 167,000 fewer jobs in those months than previously reported.
Inflation rose 0.4% in February, up from 0.3% in January and 0.2% in December. Core inflation also rose 0.4% in February (0.4% in January and 0.3% in December).
Real (inflation-adjusted) hourly earnings were down 0.4% in February, though real weekly earnings were flat owing to a gain in weekly hours worked. But there has been a trend towards fewer weekly hours, resulting in a real hourly wage gain of 1.1% in the last 12 months, but only a 0.5% real weekly gain.
The 650 members of the UK House of Commons are elected by first-past-the-post, where the candidate with more votes than any other wins the seat. The UK has five-year terms, and at the December 2019 election Boris Johnson led the Conservatives to a thumping victory.
Much has changed since 2019, with Johnson replaced as PM by Liz Truss in September 2022, then Truss was replaced by Rishi Sunak in October 2022.
Labour has led in UK national polls since late 2021, with their lead blowing out during Truss’ short stint as PM. While the Conservatives recovered some ground under Sunak, they have not been in a competitive position since Johnson was PM.
The Politico Poll of polls currently has Labour on 43%, the Conservatives on 24%, the far-right Reform on 12%, the liberal Liberal Democrats on 10%, the Greens on 5% and the Scottish National Party on 2%. The last two national polls, which were conducted after a scandal involving a Conservative donor accused of racism, gave Labour 23 and 26-point leads.
The Electoral Calculus seat forecast in late February, based on estimated vote shares in polls of 43.1% Labour, 25.2% Conservative, 9.9% Lib Dems, 10.2% Reform, 5.9% Greens and 3.2% SNP, was a massive Labour landslide, with Labour winning 455 of the 650 seats, to 113 Conservatives, 40 Lib Dems and 18 SNP.
The Conservatives have also lost six of the last seven byelections in Conservative-held seats since July 2023, five to Labour and one to the Lib Dems. In many of these losses, there were massive swings.
Sunak can call a general election at any time, but it is likely to be held in late 2024, though it could be delayed until January 2025.
Adrian Beaumont does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
– ref. With nominations decided, Trump leads Biden in US polls; UK Labour far ahead as election approaches – https://theconversation.com/with-nominations-decided-trump-leads-biden-in-us-polls-uk-labour-far-ahead-as-election-approaches-225460
]]>Comment: There has been a striking contrast in trans-Tasman interest about Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi’s visit to New Zealand and Australia.
While the Australian press has been full of articles about the visit – including his curious decision to meet with former prime minister and China booster Paul Keating – advance coverage of his meetings with Prime Minister Christopher Luxon, Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters and Trade Minister Todd McClay was relatively muted in comparison.
That is in large part a reflection of the differing states of play in each country’s relationship with Beijing: while the Australian government is still trying to lift barriers after a long-running trade spat, New Zealand finds itself on relatively surer ground.
Speaking to journalists on Tuesday morning, Peters was full of praise for his “very convivial” discussions with Wang. The two countries had promised “to heighten our relationship even further”, he said, specifically mentioning a desire to return Chinese student numbers to their pre-Covid heights.
The bonhomie appears mutual: Wang described Peters as “my old friend” in the opening remarks ahead of their meeting, further describing New Zealand as “a rational and mature cooperative partner” according to China’s official state news agency Xinhua.
The Chinese government has in recent years made a point of lavishing praise upon New Zealand, setting the country up as a model student for other Western nations with more contentious relationships with the Asian superpower.
Yet there remain clear points of friction in bilateral ties, not least of which the new Government’s heightened interest in taking up an ancillary role within the trilateral Aukus security pact between Australia, the United Kingdom and United States.
An article from the CCP-run Global Times included a warning for New Zealand to “stay away from the US chessboard”, with the Aukus pact viewed by some as an effort to contain China.
Peters confirmed that Wang had raised New Zealand’s interest in Aukus but was unrepentant about the exploratory discussions, offering a firm defence of “the right of countries to organise their defence arrangements”.
“Countries are entitled to make up their minds about their defence interests or their security interests, and to think otherwise is to live in some imaginary environment previously described by a former Prime Minister [Helen Clark] as a benign strategic environment.”
That hawkishness seems unlikely to dissipate any time soon – particularly given Luxon’s emphasis on working in closer alignment with traditional (and generally Western) partners on the international stage.
“It was just a matter of making certain that he understood that we did not have imaginary concerns about long-term security,” Peters said of his discussions with Wang.
The exact nature of those concerns was made clear in an official press release from the minister’s office on Monday night after the meetings. Talking up the constructive role China could play in responding to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Israel’s war in Gaza, he was less welcoming when it came to China’s efforts to sign security deals in the Pacific, emphasising “the importance of engaging through existing regional institutions and arrangements”.
Expanding on those remarks further to media, Peters said: “We have a set of agreements in the Pacific that need to be honoured … and we want outside countries or other countries not a part of that [Pacific Islands] Forum relationship to respect those agreements.”
That may not dissuade China from continuing its efforts to build influence, particularly given other countries such as the US and Australia (and New Zealand for that matter) are signing their own bilateral security deals with Pacific nations, albeit with nods to the forum’s various declarations.
There are other, lesser areas of contention too, such as the shipment of Chinese-made weapons to Russian troops; Peters said he had expressed concern about such support, while acknowledging such sales had not taken place at a state-to-state level.
While Chinese readouts of the meetings mentioned New Zealand’s role in the Belt and Road Initiative, there still appears to have been no meaningful achievements under the memorandum of arrangement signed by the National government in 2017.
Peters is an established critic of the decision to sign the agreement, and said on Tuesday he was “still waiting” for the Chinese government to explain exactly what the initiative meant – leading Newsroom to question the point of a cooperation agreement without any actual cooperation.
“Well, it’s a good question, but if a previous government entered an arrangement haphazardly without any idea what they were entering and not having given it any framework or any flesh, it’s not really our responsibility to try and do that in 2024,” Peters responded, an indication that the deal remains in deep freeze.
But it is New Zealand’s potential involvement in Aukus, and China’s diplomatic manoeuvres in the Pacific, that remain most likely to spark friction between the countries – although China’s intentions regarding the “reunification” of Taiwan remain a wild card.
With Peters letting the cat out of the bag on a visit to China by McClay next month, and Luxon “not long after that”, there will be further chances soon to test the temperature of the relationship.
The post Frictions not far from surface in NZ-China talks appeared first on Newsroom.
]]>After years of pressuring banks and other institutions to stop investing in fossil fuels, climate campaigners are making some progress. So how does divestment work?
For years, climate activists have been pushing banks and other big institutions to divest from fossil fuels. New research from climate advocacy group 350 Aotearoa shows that this public pressure has in many cases been effective, but that New Zealand’s Australian-owned big banks are well behind their domestic peers.
Divestment (or disinvestment) is the opposite of investment – choosing not to invest money in particular companies or causes. This can simply be withdrawing money from a company that isn’t doing well financially, but globally, it’s been used as a way to exert public pressure on organisations to no longer invest in areas that are considered harmful. 350.org, an international organisation with a New Zealand branch, has led a push to get big organisations to stop investing in fossil fuels around the world.
“A project can’t go ahead without the finance to back it,” says Adam Currie, a campaigner from 350 Aotearoa. “If they don’t provide funding, coal companies can’t get it out of the ground. ” If there is widespread divestment from fossil fuels, then these projects can be stopped; it’s an alternative to making laws that ban fossil fuel extraction.
As well as banks, divestment can target institutions like universities and insurance companies; for instance, in 2021 Harvard University in the US announced that it would end investments from its $US41.9bn endowment in fossil fuels.
Since 2015, 350 has been examining New Zealand banks to see which ones are best for the climate. Its latest round of research, released last week, showed serious progress: nearly every bank has already exited or has plans to exit funding thermal coal mining by 2030, and New Zealand-owned banks Kiwibank, Cooperative, SBS and TSB have no major fossil fuel investments.
The research is based on publicly available information as well as through discussions with the banks themselves. “When we engage with banks, the detail they provide shows how engaged they are with this issue, and how much the public cares about fossil fuels,” Currie says.
“This shows that banks are moving in the right direction, they just have to put their foot on the accelerator,” Currie adds. He laughs, thinking about his metaphor. “Or maybe I mean pull the fossil-fuel-free brake.”
Kiwibank, the world’s first bank to commit to withholding banking services from coal, oil and gas companies, is top of the list in terms of sustainability. ANZ, whose parent company in Australia has financed fossil fuel expansion projects that will create 5.3 billion tonnes of carbon, is the worst, according to the 350 research.
Of the big Australian-owned banks – Westpac, ASB, BNZ and ANZ – their New Zealand arms have minimal fossil fuel investments. However, their Australian owners (Westpac Group, Commonwealth Bank of Australia, National Australian Bank and ANZ Australia respectively) still have significant fossil fuel interests.
“The big four are in contractual relationships [with fossil fuel companies] and aren’t divesting,” Currie says. While Westpac Group has made the most progress, and promised to exit thermal coal funding by 2025, five years sooner than other banks, it still has $AU1.18bn invested in fossil fuel projects with plans to expand.
Currie says that the near-universal commitment by banks to stop providing funding to thermal coal projects is a sign that divestment tactics are working. “Thermal coal is one of the worst emissions creators – it’s an outrageous investment because it’s so damaging to the climate.”
Divestment can make it harder for coal, oil and gas producers to get funding for their new mining projects, slowing these developments down. However, there are loopholes, where banks can fund separate entities that then invest in fossil fuel expansion, and overseas groups can also continue to put money into these developments.
There are strong financial reasons to not invest in fossil fuels: surveying, extraction and processing are expensive activities, and require large amounts of up-front investment. A decade ago, fossil fuel companies were some of the most profitable in the world, but now, the energy sector is the smallest sector represented in key stock market index S&P500.
“It’s a moral signal to other companies – a way to use their influence to stop fossil fuel production,” Currie says. While many banks have expressed commitments to stop putting money into climate-damaging companies, he says progress needs to go faster. In a climate crisis, Currie says, “winning slowly is losing.”
Other big organisations that invest significant amounts of money and work with the public also need to divest, Currie says. For example, last year shares owned by ACC were responsible for making about 3.5 million tonnes of carbon dioxide. For comparison, New Zealand’s per capita emissions in 2021 were 15 tonnes; the average in Kenya was 2.1 tonnes. Other government funds, like the New Zealand Super Fund, have already committed to not funding fossil fuel projects to make their money more resilient to climate change. However, many Kiwisaver schemes are still putting New Zealanders’ money into fossil fuels.
As a consumer, Currie says that one of the best things you can do is to switch to a bank that is fossil fuel-free. If you switch banks then you should tell your bank why you’re switching, to make it clear that it’s because of its fossil investments. “If it’s not possible to switch, you can also send a letter encouraging your bank to change,” he says. From a financial as well as an ethical perspective, it makes sense to him to reduce the amount of money invested in fossil fuels. “Lots of people want to live their day-to-day lives and not have their savings for their kids’ future to be funding the destruction of their kids’ future.”
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For Boba, Ethan and Ashley, K-pop is a place to belong, a way to express themselves, and a bridge to connect with others.
The three young Polynesians are part of a K-pop fan community in Tāmaki Makaurau. It’s one of many that have sprung up worldwide as K-pop has gone from a musical genre in South Korea to a global cultural phenomenon.
Boba, from Henderson, has struggled to find a place to belong. As a non-binary queer and disabled person, they were bullied at school. Now, we see them dancing at K-pop events and in a photo booth with friends.
“It just comforts you,” says Ethan, a dancer who grew up in Fiji, Tuvalu, and Sāmoa. The documentary follows him returning to Fiji to teach K-pop techniques. He says that through dance he expresses himself – but not enough Pacific men do so because of stigma.
Ashley, who is Cook Island Niuean, reignited her love of dance through K-pop and now passes that along as a teacher. She says that expressing yourself within Pacific cultures can sometimes be difficult, but she is taking the positive reinforcement from K-pop into her own culture.
K-POLYS, a one-off documentary, presents intimate portraits of these three Polynesian K-pop fans. Directed by Litia Tuiburelevu and made with the support of NZ On Air.
]]>For Boba, Ethan and Ashley, K-pop is a place to belong, a way to express themselves, and a bridge to connect with others. This one-off documentary presents three intimate portraits of young Polynesians who are pulled into a Korean cultural phenomenon.
K-POLYS is directed by Litia Tuiburelevu, Produced by Hex Work Productions and made with the support of NZ On Air.
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Fiji is facing an exodus of Fijians as many are leaving for overseas seeking employment and education and others are migrating, says Opposition MP Viliame Naupoto.
Speaking in Parliament, he said: “His Excellency’s speech (Ratu Wiliame Katonivere) comes after a little over one year of the coalition government in power,” he said.
“So, for the coalition government, it’s time to defend your record — if there is anything to defend at all.”
Naupoto said this must be the reason why the government had laid the blame on FijiFirst “to cover them doing little or nothing at all”.
He said there had been a sharp rise in crime and that the drug problem was at a crisis level.
Citing the International Monetary Fund, Naupoto said the economy was slowing down at 3 percent and life was hard on the ground.
“There’s a general shortage of skilled workers, there is brain drain as well.
“FijiFirst put in place policies to reverse that brain drain and turn it into a brain gain where Fijians could come back and invest in our country.
“This government, it looks like, will be a brain drain gone.”
Naupoto added that the opposition would never shy away from its job of criticising and asking tough questions of the government.
Wata Shaw is a Fiji Times reporter. Republished with permission.
Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz
]]>Teammates who spend all their time picking fights with spectators are only helpful for the other team, writes Madeleine Chapman.
Anyone who has ever played a team sport competitively, particularly as a child and particularly, for some reason, basketball, will know that there’s a lot of politics involved. While there are some rare cases of a dozen teenagers putting aside their personal differences in service of a win, there will always be some personal drama that makes its way onto the court. This typically presents itself in a player being lazy on defence, or “not seeing” their frenemy wide open for a shot, or when there’s real beef, “accidentally” firing a pass way too hard for the other person to safely catch. It’s always the same players who can’t control their emotions and it results in arguments, pleading, and eventually a resigned acceptance that some teammates care more about their own feelings than the team’s success.
Winston Peters and David Seymour are those team mates. We might have all fooled ourselves into thinking that their individualistic tendencies would wane while in a coalition government but five months in, it’s clear that Christopher Luxon is in government with National while five parties act in opposition.
Despite being the two deputy prime ministers (Peters is technically the deputy until May 2025 and the Seymour takes over, which in itself is such a luggage teammates thing to demand), both have spent much of the past month yelling at everyone, accusing people of being biased and criticising the (previous) Labour government for doing anything.
First it was Seymour, taking the proposed closure of Newshub as a chance to deliver some strangely petty remarks about journalists, then posting online a screengrab of a 1News opinion piece with a suggestion (I guess?) that the state-owned broadcaster was favouring Labour by hyperlinking to a left-wing blog.
Even if he weren’t the self-proclaimed champion of free speech, questioning the editorial decisions of TVNZ in the middle of major industry cuts would be immature at best. But immature is exactly what Seymour has proven himself to be, because mere days later, he was posting seven-year-old screenshots of tweets from the co-chair of Health Coalition Aotearoa after HCA criticised Seymour’s proposal to scrap the free school lunches programme. The tweets were not kind to Seymour but they were also posted on a personal account as a private citizen, one tweet from 2017. Seymour, as a government minister, chose to share them publicly as a way to (I guess?) suggest that she should not be allowed to… freely speak… on political matters. Surely a man with a suite of portfolios to manage should not be concerned with a lone citizen’s Twitter account? It’s like when you see (to keep with the metaphor) NBA players getting into scraps with spectators. Embarrassing, immature, but easier to accept from a person paid to run around on a court than a man paid to soon be the deputy leader of the country.
Seymour has spent far too long as a political loner, thinking he needs to yell constantly in order to be noticed, scrapping for every possession. But when you’re part of a winning team and you have the ball, constantly yelling and picking fights with spectators just makes you look like you can’t handle the spotlight.
Not to be outdone, over the weekend Peters entered the fray with his state of the nation address. In it, he veered from even his own embargoed script and compared co-governance to Nazi Germany (he’s since doubled down on his choice of comparison and rolled out some of his usual tired insults and anti-trans rhetoric). That meant in a week where the Green Party revealed a third MP scandal in 12 months with Darleen Tana being stood down after allegations of migrant exploitation against her husband’s company, all of Sunday and most of Monday’s news coverage was instead dedicated to Peters essentially talking shit. Any reasonable person would say this was a foolish move from the government, but Peters and Seymour are only part of the government on paper. In reality, they throw the ball to whoever they like, whenever they like.
Separately, why have the two coalition minor party leaders delivered state of the nation addresses when Luxon delivered one on behalf of the government? Because they’re luggage teammates, that’s why. Seymour hasn’t experienced having a higher-ranked colleague in a decade and is evidently struggling to adjust to being both in power and not in charge, and Peters has never once worked well with others.
All this is simply the art of distraction, and on Monday afternoon while announcing a crackdown on “anti-social” Kainga Ora tenants, Luxon was asked about his deputy prime minister’s own anti-social behaviour in citing Nazi Germany when talking about the previous government. “There is a need for everyone to be very careful with their language… I don’t agree with those comments, it’s not the way I would have expressed it,” he said. He also said he would be speaking to Peters about it, though I can’t imagine how fruitful such a discussion would be were it ever to happen. Meanwhile, a report for corporate clients from pollster Talbot Mills suggests Luxon is struggling to connect with voters. He’s certainly committed plenty of his own fumbles in recent months but despite Peters and Seymour acting as if they’re independents, Luxon will never escape their trails of destruction.
I spent three years in a basketball team that had players who put their own emotions before the team. They were all technically excellent and when we worked well together, we were stronger than any team in the country. But they never did figure out how to be good team players, and as a result we never won when it mattered.
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The long-running Wellington music festival is too focused on the Jim Beam-ness and not enough on the Homegrown-ness.
There is something about Homegrown that’s difficult to place. A barely perceptible-ness. Like feeling a ghost is watching you from the corner of the room but when you look, there’s nothing there.
Homegrown capitalises on nostalgia; the reason you go is to listen to the music you grew up with. Not only that, the line-up is the same each year, so when you go again you get nostalgic about the previous time you went. It’s nostalgia-ception. The numbers back this up. A quarter of the artists at this year’s festival appeared last year. In fact, a sixth of them performed at the inaugural edition in 2008.
It’s hard not to feel that Homegrown is stuck in a bygone era, both in terms of music and drinking culture. The crowds are messier and drunker than comparable city-centre festivals like Laneway or Electric Avenue. As one overly-excited girl near the portaloos told us, “Homegrown is a bit like my ex. Pretty fun on the surface but struggles to communicate what he really is: a binge-drinker.”
Just like the festival itself, attending Homegrown every year has become repetitive. As is typical with most festivals, the first thing you do is agree in a group chat with your mates when you’re going to arrive (e.g. 2pm). You then spend ages getting ready, forget what time it is, and not enjoy a beer that you had to scull so you can still make it on time to meet your friends (3pm).
After finally getting out the door, you are inevitably distracted by side-quests such as tattoos, losing your wallet, getting a McChicken and sitting on the curb at BP Connect, and (if you’re so inclined) figuring out which choice anatomical spot you will stash your festival enhancers to get past security.
Of course, you wear an outfit that’s slightly inappropriate for the weather (dressing for Wellington weather is an impossible task), drunkenly line up to have your bag checked and your youthfulness questioned by someone who looks like a high schooler in a hi-vis vest.
Where at most festivals you’d start by checking the schedule of music for each stage, at Homegrown it doesn’t really matter. You can simply follow the crowd knowing that you’ll eventually be towed to the front-left of a Kiwi icon, or at worst, Shapeshifter.
Following the crowd or not, touring the festival’s five stages goes something like this.
Park Stage had the friendliest crowd. Stan Walker serenaded the sunset as two lads in duck shirts wound-up for the world’s longest chahoooo (at least 10 chh’s were counted). We also counted at least five people passed out and unaccompanied in bushes.
At Tiger Electronic Stage, Lee Mvtthews drew a surprisingly multi-generational crowd – perhaps because it was so warm inside the tent. Enjoyably, we spotted one guy watching the league on his phone, which he held up so those behind him could partake too.
The City Stage traditionally plays host to some of our biggest music icons. Last year it was Dave Dobbyn, this year New Zealand’s sweetheart Bic Runga. It’s a curious logistical decision that doesn’t seem to respect the artists or match the energy of the crowd. At one point security guards singled out a man who was completely sober with a green laser pointer and made him drink an entire bottle of water. Thrilling.
Lagoon stage, named for its proximity to a lagoon that you can’t actually see, had the youngest crowd. David Dallas and Savage brought the best of 2014-era New Zealand hip hop and 2014 antics. (Yes, inviting all the girls on-stage actually happened.)
The George FM Container Rave had great music and the highest density of sunglasses. Interesting for a spot where you can’t see any sun.
The Rock stage had the middle-agiest crowd. It was also the loudest. Maybe it’s the rock music, maybe it’s because the demographic are hard of hearing. But it was exactly like you’d imagine it to be: hundreds of black zip up hoodies, these things called cigarettes that people used before they learned to vape, and Jim Beam bourbon and colas that tasted exactly like Jim Beam bourbon and colas.
The most important part of any festival is, of course, the Portaloos. This has been a weak point for Homegrown in the past, but this year they were a total highlight. The toilets flushed, had liquid hand soap, didn’t smell and, very usefully, had lights (ever tried piss in a dark Portaloo while drunk?). Di from Spik-and-Span was absolutely on top of her game, keeping the whole operation clean and chatting to the girls to make sure they were OK. A top notch lass.
However, for a festival all about celebrating New Zealand music, the toilets being the main highlight isn’t necessarily a good thing.
Homegrown gets a lot right, like the ability to appeal to many people from different generations and walks of life, or spotlighting Wellington’s beautiful waterfront. However, the festival organisers are missing the mark for one important reason: Their choice of naming sponsor, and the vibe it fosters.
The lines for drinks are scrappy. There’s always a few too many people on the ground who’ve been taken advantage of by their drink. And while younger generations tend to be the target of anti-problematic drinking campaigns, the older generations were noticeably drunker, sloppier and more aggressive than their fresher-faced counterparts. Like a time-machine, Jim Beam Homegrown not only allows, but intends for its attendees to revisit a partying culture of decades prior.
And this is its problem. Jim Beam Homegrown is too focused on the Jim Beam-ness, but not enough on the Homegrown-ness. It promotes drinking more than music.
The remedy however, lies within. In glimmers, Homegrown offers the best of kiwi culture. People sharing space and having a good time, that pure meaning-of-life shit. This is the culture the festival could be promoting: good people, good yarns, good kai and great music all brought together for one hell of a time.
We wondered, as we skipped out past five ambulances and two cop cars on the way to our next adventure. Is it too late to bring some of that New Zealand skuxness back to what could be our flagship festival?
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How do you manage your emails? Are you an “inbox zero” kind of person, or do you just leave thousands of them unread?
Our new study, published today in the journal Information Research, suggests that leaving all your emails in the inbox is likely to leave you dissatisfied with your personal records management.
In an exploratory survey, we asked participants how they dealt with their personal records such as bills, online subscriptions and similar items. Many of these arrive by email.
We found that most respondents left their electronic records in their email. Only half saved items such as bills and other documents to other locations, like their computer or the cloud. But having a disorganised inbox also led to problems, including missing bills and losing track of important correspondence.
Receiving bills, insurance renewals and other household documents by email saves time and money, and reduces unnecessary paper use.
However, there are risks involved if you don’t stay on top of your electronic records. Respondents in our research reported issues such as lapsed vehicle registration, failing to cancel unwanted subscriptions, and overlooking tax deductions because it was too much trouble finding the receipts.
This suggests late fines and other email oversights could be costing people hundreds of dollars each year.
In addition to the financial costs, research suggests that not sorting and managing electronic records makes it more difficult to put together the information needed at tax time, or for other high-stakes situations, such as loan applications.
Read more:
Why do I get so much spam and unwanted email in my inbox? And how can I get rid of it?
We surveyed over 300 diverse respondents on their personal electronic records management. Most of them were from Australia, but we also received responses from other countries, such as the United Kingdom, United States, Switzerland, Portugal and elsewhere.
Two-thirds of the respondents used their email to manage personal records, such as bills, receipts, subscriptions and more. Of those, we found that once respondents had dealt with their email, about half of them would sort the emails into folders, while the other half would leave everything in the inbox.
While most sorted their workplace email into folders, they were much less likely to sort their personal email in the same way.
The results also showed that only half (52%) of respondents who left all their email in the inbox were satisfied with their records management, compared to 71% of respondents who sorted their email into folders.
Of the respondents who saved their paperwork in the cloud (Google Drive, iCloud, Dropbox and similar), 83% reported being satisfied with their home records management.
The study was exploratory, so further research will be needed to see if our findings apply more universally. However, our statistical analysis did reveal practices associated with more satisfactory outcomes, and ones that might be better to avoid.
Based on the responses, we have identified three main problems with leaving all your email in the inbox.
First, users can lose track of the tasks that need to be done. For example, a bill that needs to be paid could slip down the line unnoticed, drowned by other emails.
Second, relying on search to re-find emails means you need to know exactly what you’re looking for. For example, at tax time searching for charity donation receipts depends on remembering what to search for, as well as the exact wording in the email containing the receipt.
Third, many bills and statements are not sent as attachments to emails, but rather as hyperlinks. If you change your bank or another service provider, those hyperlinks may not be accessible at a later date. Not being able to access missing payslips from a former employer can also cause issues, as shown by the Robodebt scandal or the recent case of the Australian Tax Office reviving old debts.
When we asked respondents to nominate a preferred location for keeping their personal records, they tended to choose a more organised format than their current behaviour. Ideally, only 8% of the respondents would leave everything in their email inbox, unsorted.
Our findings suggest a set of practices that can help you get on top of your electronic records and prevent stress or financial losses:
sort your email into category folders, or save records in folders in the cloud or on a computer
download documents that are not attached to emails or sent to you – such as utility bills and all your payslips
put important renewals in your calendar as reminders, and
delete junk mail and unsubscribe, so that your inbox can be turned into a to-do list.
Matt Balogh previously received funding from an Australian Government Research Training Stipend Scholarship.
– ref. Do you have 7,513 unread emails in your inbox? Research suggests that’s unwise – https://theconversation.com/do-you-have-7-513-unread-emails-in-your-inbox-research-suggests-thats-unwise-225181
]]>Australia’s political donations rules are woefully inadequate, but donations reform is finally on the agenda. The federal government has signalled its interest in reform and will soon begin briefing MPs on its plan. Greater transparency on who is donating, caps on donations, and limits on campaign expenditure are all on the table. Here’s what the government should – and shouldn’t – do.
Rules around political donations at the federal level have long lagged the states. Under the federal rules, only donations of more than $16,300 need to be on the public record. Before the last federal election, Labor promised to lower this threshold to $1,000, in line with NSW, Victoria, and Queensland, and it is now seeking to fulfil this promise.
Donations from the same donor should also be aggregated by political parties to prevent “donations splitting”.
Quicker reporting of political donations is long overdue. Under the current system, it takes at least seven months and sometimes up to 19 months for a large donation to be made public. Introducing “real time” disclosure requirements would mean that Australians know who’s donating while policy issues – and elections – are still “live”.
These three changes – reducing the donations disclosure threshold, aggregating donations from the same donor, and publishing the data in real time – are all quite simple reforms that could be implemented quickly. And there is likely to be widespread support across parliament for these sorts of transparency measures, so this would be a good place to start.
Where things get trickier is around caps – on both political donations and campaign spending. Both types of caps were supported by a recent parliamentary committee inquiry into the 2022 election, and Labor has signalled its interest in these bigger reforms.
A cap on political donations aims to reduce the influence of any one donor. Clive Palmer’s record-breaking donations in the lead-up to the 2019 and 2022 federal elections have highlighted the potential for wealthy individuals to have substantial influence in Australian elections.
The trick will be in setting the right level for the cap: low enough to be meaningful, yet high enough to enable new entrants to raise the funds necessary to compete with existing players. Some people show their political support with time, others with money, so donations caps need to allow for different forms of democratic participation too.
Caps on campaign spending would be the real game-changer though. Parties and candidates can currently spend as much money as they can raise, so big money means greater capacity to sell your message to voters.
Capping expenditure in the lead-up to elections would limit the “arms race” to raise more and more funds, and ultimately reduce parties’ dependency on major donors. It is this dependency that “buys” donors substantial access to politicians – and access means opportunities to sway public decisions in the donor’s favour.
Caps on campaign spending would be a big reform to reduce the influence of money in politics. But there are several design issues that still need to be resolved.
Given that other groups, such as unions and industry peak bodies, may campaign on political issues, their political expenditure would also need to be capped. A higher cap should apply for political parties – the primary players in an election – than for third parties.
Independents have warned that spending caps could create barriers for new entrants. A “one-size-fits-all” model would favour the major parties because they are already well known and usually contest every seat. At a minimum, caps are needed both for total spend and per electorate, to prevent major parties pooling their resources to fight just a few seats.
Read more:
A full ban on political donations would level the playing field – but is it the best approach?
These challenges are not insurmountable. NSW has long had expenditure caps in place for state elections and offers a model the federal government could follow.
Another way to resolve many of the concerns would be for the cap to apply to political advertising expenditure only. The idea would be to limit political-party and third-party advertising during election campaigns, but not restrict political expression through more grass-roots channels, or at other times.
The government should take the time to get this right. Campaign spending caps would be a bold reform that would strongly benefit from agreement across the parliament. Even if a quick consensus could be reached, the Australian Electoral Commission would still need time to implement the changes, so this reform would not be ready for the next federal election.
The government should take a consultative approach on caps to land a model that has broad support and trust. But there is no need to delay the transparency reforms. If the government moves quickly, Australians could have much better information on who funds political parties when we head to the polls in 2025.
The Grattan Institute began with contributions to its endowment of $15 million from each of the Federal and Victorian Governments, $4 million from BHP Billiton, and $1 million from NAB. In order to safeguard its independence, Grattan Institute’s board controls this endowment. The funds are invested and contribute to funding Grattan Institute’s activities. Grattan Institute also receives funding from corporates, foundations, and individuals to support its general activities as disclosed on its website.
– ref. Political donations rules are finally in the spotlight – here’s what the government should do – https://theconversation.com/political-donations-rules-are-finally-in-the-spotlight-heres-what-the-government-should-do-225901
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Naiyana Somchitkaeo/Shutterstock
A recent study published in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine has linked microplastics with risk to human health.
The study involved patients in Italy who had a condition called carotid artery plaque, where plaque builds up in arteries, potentially blocking blood flow. The researchers analysed plaque specimens from these patients.
They found those with carotid artery plaque who had microplastics and nanoplastics in their plaque had a higher risk of heart attack, stroke, or death (compared with carotid artery plaque patients who didn’t have any micro- or nanoplastics detected in their plaque specimens).
Importantly, the researchers didn’t find the micro- and nanoplastics caused the higher risk, only that it was correlated with it.
So, what are we to make of the new findings? And how does it fit with the broader evidence about microplastics in our environment and our bodies?
Microplastics are plastic particles less than five millimetres across. Nanoplastics are less than one micron in size (1,000 microns is equal to one millimetre). The precise size classifications are still a matter of debate.
Microplastics and nanoplastics are created when everyday products – including clothes, food and beverage packaging, home furnishings, plastic bags, toys and toiletries – degrade. Many personal care products contain microsplastics in the form of microbeads.
Plastic is also used widely in agriculture, and can degrade over time into microplastics and nanoplastics.
These particles are made up of common polymers such as polyethylene, polypropylene, polystyrene and polyvinyl chloride. The constituent chemical of polyvinyl chloride, vinyl chloride, is considered carcinogenic by the US Environmental Protection Agency.
Of course, the actual risk of harm depends on your level of exposure. As toxicologists are fond of saying, it’s the dose that makes the poison, so we need to be careful to not over-interpret emerging research.
Read more:
Australians are washing microplastics down the drain and it’s ending up on our farms
This new study in the New England Journal of Medicine was a small cohort, initially comprising 304 patients. But only 257 completed the follow-up part of the study 34 months later.
The study had a number of limitations. The first is the findings related only to asymptomatic patients undergoing carotid endarterectomy (a procedure to remove carotid artery plaque). This means the findings might not be applicable to the wider population.
The authors also point out that while exposure to microplastics and nanoplastics has been likely increasing in recent decades, heart disease rates have been falling.
That said, the fact so many people in the study had detectable levels of microplastics in their body is notable. The researchers found detectable levels of polyethylene and polyvinyl chloride (two types of plastic) in excised carotid plaque from 58% and 12% of patients, respectively.
These patients were more likely to be younger men with diabetes or heart disease and a history of smoking. There was no substantive difference in where the patients lived.
Inflammation markers in plaque samples were more elevated in patients with detectable levels of microplastics and nanoplastics versus those without.
And, then there’s the headline finding: patients with microplastics and nanoplastics in their plaque had a higher risk of having what doctors call “a primary end point event” (non-fatal heart attack, non-fatal stroke, or death from any cause) than those who did not present with microplastics and nanoplastics in their plaque.
The authors of the study note their results “do not prove causality”.
However, it would be remiss not to be cautious. The history of environmental health is replete with examples of what were initially considered suspect chemicals that avoided proper regulation because of what the US National Research Council refers to as the “untested-chemical assumption”. This assumption arises where there is an absence of research demonstrating adverse effects, which obviates the requirement for regulatory action.
In general, more research is required to find out whether or not microplastics cause harm to human health. Until this evidence exists, we should adopt the precautionary principle; absence of evidence should not be taken as evidence of absence.
Exposure to microplastics in our home, work and outdoor environments is inevitable. Governments across the globe have started to acknowledge we must intervene.
The Global Plastics Treaty will be enacted by 175 nations from 2025. The treaty is designed, among other things, to limit microplastic exposure globally. Burdens are greatest especially in children and especially those in low-middle income nations.
In Australia, legislation ending single use plastics will help. So too will the increased rollout of container deposit schemes that include plastic bottles.
Microplastics pollution is an area that requires a collaborative approach between researchers, civil societies, industry and government. We believe the formation of a “microplastics national council” would help formulate and co-ordinate strategies to tackle this issue.
Read more:
The problem with Oodies: hooded blankets are cosy but they are not great for oceans or our health
Little things matter. Small actions by individuals can also translate to significant overall environmental and human health benefits.
Choosing natural materials, fabrics, and utensils not made of plastic and disposing of waste thoughtfully and appropriately – including recycling wherever possible – is helpful.
Mark Patrick Taylor is a full-time employee of EPA Victoria, appointed to the statutory role of Chief Environmental Scientist.
He previously received funding via an Australian Government Citizen Science Grant (2017-2020), CSG55984 ‘Citizen insights to the composition and risks of household dust’ (the DustSafe project). Outputs from this project included published work on microplastics with Drs Neda Sharifi Soltani and Scott Wilson who were at Macquarie University at that time.
Scott P. Wilson works for the Australian Microplastic Assessment Project run by the not for profit organisation the Total Environment Centre. He has previously received funding from the NSW EPA for research into microplastic source tracking in Deewhy Lagoon and for developing a Microlitter Reduction Framework.
– ref. Study links microplastics with human health problems – but there’s still a lot we don’t know – https://theconversation.com/study-links-microplastics-with-human-health-problems-but-theres-still-a-lot-we-dont-know-225354
]]>Global climate records were shattered in 2023, from air and sea temperatures to sea-level rise and sea-ice extent. Scores of countries recorded their hottest year and numerous weather disasters occurred as climate change reared its head.
How did Australia’s environment fare against this onslaught? In short, 2023 was a year of opposites.
For the past nine years, we have trawled through huge volumes of data collected by satellites, measurement stations and surveys by individuals and agencies. We include data on global change, oceans, people, weather, water, soils, vegetation, fire and biodiversity.
Each year, we analyse those data, summarising them in an annual report that includes an overall Environmental Condition Score and regional scorecards. These scores provide a relative measure of conditions for agriculture and ecosystems. Scores declined across the country, except in the Northern Territory, but were still relatively good.
However, the updated Threatened Species Index shows the abundance of listed bird, mammal and plant species has continued to decline at a rate of about 3% a year since the turn of the century.
Read more:
How 2023’s record heat worsened droughts, floods and bushfires around the world
Worldwide, 77 countries broke temperature records. Australia was not one of them. Our annual average temperature was 0.53°C below the horror year 2019. Temperatures in the seas around us were below the records of 2022.
Even so, 2023 was among Australia’s eight warmest years in both cases. All eight came after 2005.
However, those numbers are averaged over the year. Dig a bit deeper and it becomes clear 2023 was a climate rollercoaster.
The year started as wet as the previous year ended, but dry and unseasonably warm weather set in from May to October. Soils and wetlands across much of the country started drying rapidly. In the eastern states, the fire season started as early as August.
Nonetheless, there was generally still enough water to support good vegetation growth throughout the unusually warm and sunny winter months.
Fears of a severe fire season were not realised as El Niño’s influence waned in November and rainfall returned, in part due to the warm oceans. Combined with relatively high temperatures, it made for a hot and humid summer. A tropical cyclone and several severe storms caused flooding in Queensland and Victoria in December.
As always, there were regional differences. Northern Australia experienced the best rainfall and growth conditions in several years. This contributed to more grass fires than average during the dry season. On the other hand, the rain did not return to Western Australia and Tasmania, which ended the year dry.
Every year we calculate an Environmental Condition Score that combines weather, water and vegetation data.
The national score was 7.5 (out of 10). That was 1.2 points lower than for 2022, but still the second-highest score since 2011.
Scores declined across the country except for the Northern Territory, which chalked up a score of 8.8 thanks to a strong monsoon season. With signs of drought developing in parts of Western Australia, it had the lowest score of 5.5.
The Environmental Condition Score reflects environmental conditions, but does not measure the long-term health of natural ecosystems and biodiversity.
Firstly, it relates only to the land and not our oceans. Marine heatwaves damaged ecosystems along the eastern coast. Surveys in the first half of 2023 suggested the recovery of the Great Barrier Reef plateaued.
However, a cyclone and rising ocean temperatures occurred later in the year. In early 2024, another mass coral bleaching event developed.
Secondly, the score does not capture important processes affecting our many threatened species. Among the greatest dangers are invasive pests and diseases, habitat destruction and damage from severe weather events such as heatwaves and megafires.
Read more:
New ecosystems, unprecedented climates: more Australian species than ever are struggling to survive
The Threatened Species Index captures data from long-term threatened species monitoring. The index is updated annually with a three-year lag, largely due to delays in data processing and sharing. This means the 2023 index includes data up to 2020.
The index showed an unrelenting decline of about 3% in the abundance of Australia’s threatened bird, mammal and plant species each year. This amounts to an overall decline of 61% from 2000 to 2020.
The index for birds in 2023 revealed declines were most severe for terrestrial birds (62%), followed by migratory shorebirds (47%) and marine birds (24%).
A record 130 species were added to Australia’s threatened species lists in 2023. That’s many more than the annual average of 29 species over previous years. The 2019–2020 Black Summer bushfires had direct impacts on half the newly listed species.
Australia’s population passed 27 million in 2023, a stunning increase of 8 million, or 41%, since 2000. Those extra people all needed living space, food, electricity and transport.
Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions have risen by 18% since 2000. Despite small declines in the previous four years, emissions increased again in 2023, mostly due to air travel rebounding after COVID-19.
Our emissions per person are the tenth-highest in the world and more than three times those of the average global citizen. The main reasons are our coal-fired power stations, inefficient road vehicles and large cattle herd.
Nonetheless, there are reasons to be optimistic. Many other countries have dramatically reduced emissions without compromising economic growth or quality of life. All we have to do is to finally follow their lead.
Our governments have an obvious role to play, but we can do a lot as individuals. We can even save money, by switching to renewable energy and electric vehicles and by eating less beef.
Changing our behaviour will not stop climate change in its tracks, but will slow it down over the next decades and ultimately reverse it. We cannot reverse or even stop all damage to our environment, but we can certainly do much better.
Australia’s Environment is produced by the ANU Fenner School for Environment & Society and the Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network (TERN), an NCRIS-enabled National Research Infrastructure. Albert Van Dijk receives or has previously received funding from several government-funded agencies, grant schemes and programmes.
Tayla Lawrie is a current employee of the Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network (TERN), funded by the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy.
Shoshana Rapley does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
– ref. On a climate rollercoaster: how Australia’s environment fared in the world’s hottest year – https://theconversation.com/on-a-climate-rollercoaster-how-australias-environment-fared-in-the-worlds-hottest-year-225268
]]>As part of our series exploring how New Zealanders live and our relationship with money, a teacher explains why he and his partner are in frugal mode – and how they’re making it work.
Gender: Male
Age: 35
Ethnicity: Pākehā
Role: I am an intermediate school teacher and my partner is a head of department at a local secondary school.
Salary/income/assets: $205k per year between us before tax.
My living location is: Urban (central Auckland).
Rent/mortgage per week: $500 rent – we live in a small two-bedroom flat that my parents own and cut us a very good deal on.
Student loan or other debt payments per week: We tried to start a business in 2020 which failed. Between us we have $90,000 in personal loan debt from that adventure. I have paid off my student loan and my partner has about $20,000 left on hers.
Typical weekly food costs
Groceries: $200 for the two of us.
Eating out and takeaways: We eat out about once a month and spend around $50 a week on takeaways.
Workday lunches: Nothing – leftovers from dinner the night before.
Cafe coffees/snacks: Nil.
Other food costs: $80 for dog food for our ravenous husky x border collie.
Savings: We have about $90,000 in our combined KiwiSaver accounts at the moment and just had to empty our emergency savings account this week.
I worry about money: Always, multiple times a day, and in my sleep.
Three words to describe my financial situation would be: Finding our feet.
My biggest edible indulgence would be… Dairy-free Magnums.
In a typical week my alcohol expenditure would be… Nil – stopped drinking at the start of this year.
In a typical week my transport expenditure would be… Nil – we own an electric car and an e-bike which we charge at home on an off peak plan overnight.
I estimate in the past year the ballpark amount I spent on my personal clothing (including sleepwear and underwear) was… $400.
My most expensive clothing in the past year was… New pair of New Balance shoes.
My last pair of shoes cost… $189.
My grooming/beauty expenditure includes: Shaving cream and razors – $20 per month probably.
My exercise expenditure in a year is about: $300 for running shoes, $50 for a running top and shorts from Kmart, $200 for football team membership fees.
My last Friday night cost… I returned from supervising school camp so was in bed by 7.30pm, so nothing.
Most regrettable purchase in the last 12 months was… Forgot to update our calendar about a counselling appointment which we missed and still had to pay for.
Most indulgent purchase (that I don’t regret) in the last 12 months was: I bought a new e-bike to get to work after selling our car. I love it but it was expensive.
One area where I’m a bit of a tightwad is: is… Hah, just ONE? Everywhere.
Five words to describe my financial personality would be: Worried, anxious, scared, frugal, strict.
I grew up in a house where money… Secretive and revered. My parents’ approach was to drill into us that the only thing to do with money is to save it. I feel guilty every time I spend any money and it’s not pleasant.
The last time my Eftpos card was declined was… Years ago, probably when I was just starting out as a teacher.
In five years, in financial terms, I see myself… More stable – out of debt and working towards owning our own home.
I would love to have more money for… Holidays and weekend adventures.
Describe your financial low: Right now – we have a budget and 50% of our income is going to pay off debt. We took a risk and it didn’t work out. We are incredibly lucky to have even been able to try and we knew this might be an option so we are just putting our heads down and working for the next couple of years.
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Binge
Mary & George, the new British television drama series, depicts the real-life story of Mary Villiers and her son George, and their social climbing at the early 17th century English royal court.
George Villiers rose from humble beginnings to cup-bearer in 1614, Gentleman of the Bedchamber in 1615, and ultimately to the royal favourite of King James VI & I, amassing many titles and court appointments. In 1623 he was made Duke of Buckingham, the only duke who was not a member of the royal family.
In Mary & George, Mary moulds George to be James’ lover, where he would become the second-most powerful man in England. But from dizzying heights can come a great fall.
Much of the show is embellished for dramatic effect – it’s unclear if James actually did have sexual relationships with his male favourites, and Sir Francis Bacon did not die of syphilis.
However, other aspects of the show are fact. The Earl and Countess of Somerset were tried and found guilty of murder through poisoning (though they weren’t executed) and Frances Coke really was abducted and forced to marry John Villiers (witnesses noted her crying in the ceremony just like depicted).
Although George’s relationship with James is a central focus of the series, the Villiers women – George’s mother, sister and wife – all strategically bolstered the power and influence of their male relatives and ensured their family remained in royal favour.
Here’s what you should know about the real women behind the characters.
Read more:
How to make friends and influence people (as a 17th-century woman)
While the fictional Mary Villiers’ origins are depicted as low-born, the real Mary was from a gentry family with a good name but little money.
Mary’s four children with her first husband, George Villiers, were Susan, John, George and Christopher (“Kit”), who all feature in the show.
She married again to Sir William Rayner, and finally Sir Thomas Compton. She was created Countess of Buckingham in her own right (not tied to a husband) in 1618.
Like many women at this time who could not own property or assets due to the laws of coverture, Mary strategically married and used the other avenues available to her – such as social networking – to rise through the ranks of Jacobean society until her death in 1632.
History has not been kind to Mary. Her ambition for her family marked her as greedy, calculating and ruthless, which the show extends to lesbianism and murder despite the absence of any historical evidence.
Mary’s only daughter Susan is portrayed in the show as a quiet, timid and boring teenager. In reality Susan, who went by Sue, learned a great deal from her mother and used strategic connections to improve the social standing of her family.
In 1607, before the rise of the Villiers family at court, she married a country gentleman named William Fielding. Sue and William used George’s favour with the king to obtain many offices and titles; they were made the Countess and Earl of Denbigh in 1622.
After Charles I ascended the throne and married French princess Henrietta Maria, Sue was appointed as the most senior Lady of the Bedchamber.
Read more:
Beheaded and exiled: the two previous King Charleses bookended the abolition of the monarchy
These positions gave her vast influence at court. Surviving papers describe how she was frequently paid for “secret service” for the queen.
Over time, Sue developed a close relationship with Charles and Henrietta Maria, godparents to some of her grandchildren. Her letters show she was concerned with the social position of her own son, his education and his advancement at court.
When the queen fled for France during the English civil wars, Sue went with her and remained until her death in 1652.
In the show, George is forced into a partnership with “Katie” Manners when his mother and sister conspire to lock them in a room overnight, risking their reputations.
Young, “fertile” and wealthy, Katie describes herself as the perfect aristocratic wife.
They married in 1620 in a private ceremony witnessed only by James and her father, the Earl of Rutland. Katie became Katherine Villiers, Marchioness and then Duchess of Buckingham. She and George had four children, Mary, Charles, George and Francis.
James was Mary’s doting godfather. In his letters, he called her his grandchild, while Kate and George became his “children” and he their “dear dad”.
As the show depicts, George and the Villiers women became like a new family to James. This intimacy explains the libels which claimed Mary and George killed the king, a rumour the show brings to life.
Katherine, like Mary and Sue, became a Lady of the Bedchamber to Henrietta Maria. Katherine was pregnant when George was assassinated in 1628 and witnessed his death at the Greyhound Inn (where you can still stay) in Portsmouth.
She went into mourning, commissioning portraits and the Buckingham monument at Westminster Abbey in a chapel usually reserved for royalty. She continued to live at York House in London, marked today by its Watergate near Embankment Station.
Although she and her children remained favourites of Charles, her reconversion to Catholicism in 1628 and marriage to the Irish Catholic Randall MacDonnell in 1635 caused a strain. Katherine spent much of the civil wars in relative poverty in Ghent and Ireland, with her husband often imprisoned for his role in the Irish Confederacy.
She died in 1649, shortly after Cromwell’s conquest of Ireland, her life and the rule of Charles I both coming to an end.
But the influence of the Villers women in the royal court continued throughout the 17th century. George and Katherine’s daughter Mary married a Stewart, making their royal connections official.
Later generations of Viliers women, including Sue’s daughter Barbara also served in the households of Henrietta Maria and later, Catherine of Braganza, continuing the tradition of royal service and influence that began under Mary and George.
Sarah Bendall receives funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council UK and Parold Research Fund.
Megan Shaw does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
– ref. Intimacy, ‘secret service’ and social climbing: meet the real Villiers women behind Mary & George – https://theconversation.com/intimacy-secret-service-and-social-climbing-meet-the-real-villiers-women-behind-mary-and-george-225356
]]>This article is part of The Conversation’s series examining the housing crisis. Read the other articles in the series here.
Australian state and federal governments spend money in many ways to ease rental stress and get more Australians into home ownership. Four of the most prominent are:
Our team at Victoria University’s Centre of Policy Studies has modelled the economic impact of each of them in a way that allows their outcomes to be compared.
The bad news is that we’ve found none of the four can simultaneously lift affordability for renters, lift affordability for owners, get more Australians into home ownership, and boost economic efficiency.
The good news is we’ve found a mix that could work well.
We used Victoria University’s regional economic model to compare the effect of spending an extra A$500 million on the variant of each of the programs presently available in Victoria.
To better assess the economic impact, we assumed the extra $500 million was paid for by an increase in taxation.
We found first homeowner grants improve affordability for owners, slightly improve affordability for renters, and slightly increase home ownership rates, but come with a heavy economic cost.
The cost to economic efficiency amounts to about 20 cents for every dollar spent. Economic efficiency measures the extent to which inputs such as labour, land and capital are allocated to their most valuable uses.
Importantly, that 20 cents in the dollar cost is the economic cost of the spending, not the cost of raising the revenue to fund it.
With the average economic cost of state government taxation in the vicinity of 30 cents per dollar raised, that means every extra dollar raised to be spent on a first home buyer grant has an economic cost of about 50 cents, making it an economically expensive way to get people into homes.
Shared equity schemes in which the government part-owns a home with a buyer have similar costs, but are better at getting people into their own homes.
Our modelling finds that stamp duty discounts for first home buyers have an economic benefit. This is because stamp duty is an extraordinarily inefficient tax that makes it harder for people to move.
Unfortunately, the model also finds stamp duty discounts will make home ownership even less affordable by pushing up property prices, and make it only slightly easier for the first home owners able to get the discounts.
Rent assistance is delivered by the Commonwealth rather than states to Australians in receipt of Commonwealth benefits.
Our study finds its economic costs are low, just 5 cents for every dollar spent, meaning that raising extra tax and spending it on rent assistance should have a total economic cost of about 35 cents for each dollar raised and spent.
We find it has a significant effect in making rent more affordable, but causes home ownership rates to fall, because it tips the balance for financially strained households in favour of renting rather than buying.
If making shelter more affordable for low-income earners is the number one priority, by far the best way to do it is to boost rent assistance.
While the benefits come at the expense of home ownership, for the renters receiving them, they are worth having.
But rent assistance is federally administered. For a state government, the best way to help both owners and renters at the lowest economic cost appears to be a mix of two thirds first home buyer grants and one third stamp duty discounts.
Our modelling suggests such a blend would have a negligible impact on economic efficiency and home affordability, while allowing more owners to rent and, as a result, make renting more affordable.
However, it would be costly. From a national perspective, the same improvement in rental affordability could be achieved for less than one-tenth the financial cost if the Commonwealth were to fund additional rent assistance.
If nothing else, our modelling proves these decisions are difficult.
No single tool is perfect, but using the right mix of them can help – all the more so if the states and Commonwealth can work together. Our estimates can help.
Read more:
The Help to Buy scheme will help but won’t solve the housing crisis
The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
– ref. What’s the best way to ease rents and improve housing affordability? We modelled 4 of the government’s biggest programs – https://theconversation.com/whats-the-best-way-to-ease-rents-and-improve-housing-affordability-we-modelled-4-of-the-governments-biggest-programs-225446
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